The Madonna of the Rocks,
oil on panel, 93 x 72 cm, framed

Provenance:
Private European collection

Exhibited:
Vigevano, Castello Sforzesco. Musei Civici – Pinacoteca ‘C. Ottone’, Un capolavoro in Castello: Dopo Leonardo. Una versione ritrovata della Vergine delle Rocce, 16 December 2017 – 14 January 2018

Literature:
A. Cottino, S. Ferrari (eds.), Dopo Leonardo. Una versione ritrovata della Vergine delle Rocce, exhibition catalogue, Mantua 2017 (as Circle and Workshop of Marco d’Oggiono, around 1520)

The present painting relates to the two celebrated compositions by Leonardo in the Louvre, Paris (inv. no. 777) and in the National Gallery, London (inv. no. NG1093).

In 1483, Leonardo received the commission to paint a panel depicting the Madonna and Child for the church of San Francesco Grande in Milan. Leonardo modified the iconography stipulated in the contract, painting instead the Meeting of the Christ Child with the Infant Saint John the Baptist, an episode narrated in the Life of John according to apocryphal texts regarding the infancy of Christ. This gave rise to the composition of the Madonna of the Rocks (a name in use from the 19th century onwards), which is today one of Leonardo’s most celebrated compositions. The picture was probably the painting on panel now in the Louvre, Paris, which is stylistically dated by critics to 1483–1486; it is possible that the painting, which never reached the altar for which it was intended, was bought directly by Ludovico il Moro and later passed into the French Royal collections, from where it went to the Louvre.

In the meantime, the painter left Milan in 1499, having probably already begun a second version of the Madonna of the Rocks, which is identified as the painting now in the National Gallery, London, for which a date between the last years of the fifteenth and the first years of the sixteenth century has been proposed. The painting in the National Gallery differs from that in the Louvre in certain details, such as the absence of the gesture of the angel pointing to the Christ Child, or the presence of the halos, which do not appear in the Paris version. In fact, the present painting is closer to the London version.

With the softness of the flesh and garments, the present work is stylistically close to the version in the parish church of Santa Giustina ad Affori (see op. cit Cottino, Ferrari, 2017, p. 58), attributed to Bernardino Luini (or to his circle), which might have been the prototype for this painting. At the same time this Madonna of the Rocks resembles the styles of Giovanni Antonio Boltraffio and Giovanni Pietro Rizzoli, called il Giampietrino. The bright colours, the accentuated chiaroscuro and the plasticity of form are also reminiscent of Marco d’Oggiono, whose version of the subject is conserved in the Castello Sforzesco, Milan.

The success of Leonardo’s iconography was immediate. Already in 1508 Giovanni Ambrogio de Predis had asked for permission to copy the altarpiece of San Francesco Grande, executing an exact copy under the master’s supervision, which has yet to be identified.