DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.48088#0460
LIONARDO DA VINCI. 43
labour in exact detailed execution of this grand work which was slowly accomplished with much
painful self-criticism. He made a great many designs which are now in the Queen’s collection
of drawings at Windsor, and in which horse and rider were exhibited in every stage between
rest and impetuous motion. He seems at last to have decided upon representing the figures at
rest. The Duke, with his general’s staff in his hand, is preparing for battle. A fallen soldier
beneath the horse has been dexteriously turned to account for the support of the heavy mass.
In order to complete his preparation, he cast models of several horses and worked on with
unflagging zeal, so that in the year 1490, the gigantic task was accomplished. Sforza required
that the erection of the statue should be accompanied by a festive procession. Lionardo was
obliged to obey, and the heavy fabric was broken. The height of this statue was twenty-three
feet, and this height can only be duly estimated when it is compared with that of the equestrian
statue of Frederick the Great in Berlin, by Rauch, which is eighteen feet. The refounding of
this statue could not be completed by Lionardo till 1496. But at that time the Duke had been
reduced to such straits by his extravagance, and by the necessary expenditure on preparation for
a threatened war with France, that the casting for which Lionardo required two hundred
thousand pounds of brass, could not be begun.
This disappointment threw a doubt on the eventual success of the work, yet there was still
hope, and the master, in the mean time, undertook all necessary preliminaries at his own cost.
But who could describe his feelings, when, at the taking of Milan by the French, in 1499, his
splendid statue, the fruit of weary study, and of the incessant labour of thirteen years, was used
as a target, by Gascon archers, and maliciously destroyed before his own eyes; and yet the
French at that time marched in the van of civilization. A second restoration was impossible,
in 1500, the Duke was carried a prisoner to France, where, ten years afterwards, he died in
misery. This gigantic undertaking, which the master had twice regarded as accomplished, had
wasted many years of his life.
The last trace of the statue occurs in 1501. Duke Hercules of Ferrara endeavoured, through
his ambassador, to obtain the horse for his own monument, but the French do not seem to have
acceeded to his request, and with this notice all further information is lost. It may be assumed
that Lionardo had produced a wonderful work of art, for he had endeavoured to rival the models
of two preceding generations, Donatello’s Gattamelata in front of the Santo at Padua, and
Verocchio’s “Colleoni.” And he possessed sufficient artistic genius and technical knowledge to
maintain his superiority.
“Inward excitement is strikingly expressed in the countenance of John the Baptist, and
particularly in the expression of the two Pharisees (or rather a Pharisee and a Levite),
who are looking on; in the Levite the feeling is suppressed, but breaks out involuntarily.
The costume belongs rather to the fifteenth century, and recalls the style of Lorenzo Ghiberti,
while the naked form seems worthy of the grand and free style which marks the golden age
of Renaissance.” This opinion of J. Burkhardt may, with justice, be applied to the whole of
Lionardo’s sculpture.
The entire absorption of his time in the equestrian statue may be inferred from the fact,
that until the year 1496, there exists no record of any paintings by his hand. Likenesses of the
Duke, the Duchess and their sons, painted on oil on the wall of the refectory of the Dominican
cloister, have long since crumbled away.
By far the greater number of his pictures have suffered in the lapse of time, from his con-
11*
labour in exact detailed execution of this grand work which was slowly accomplished with much
painful self-criticism. He made a great many designs which are now in the Queen’s collection
of drawings at Windsor, and in which horse and rider were exhibited in every stage between
rest and impetuous motion. He seems at last to have decided upon representing the figures at
rest. The Duke, with his general’s staff in his hand, is preparing for battle. A fallen soldier
beneath the horse has been dexteriously turned to account for the support of the heavy mass.
In order to complete his preparation, he cast models of several horses and worked on with
unflagging zeal, so that in the year 1490, the gigantic task was accomplished. Sforza required
that the erection of the statue should be accompanied by a festive procession. Lionardo was
obliged to obey, and the heavy fabric was broken. The height of this statue was twenty-three
feet, and this height can only be duly estimated when it is compared with that of the equestrian
statue of Frederick the Great in Berlin, by Rauch, which is eighteen feet. The refounding of
this statue could not be completed by Lionardo till 1496. But at that time the Duke had been
reduced to such straits by his extravagance, and by the necessary expenditure on preparation for
a threatened war with France, that the casting for which Lionardo required two hundred
thousand pounds of brass, could not be begun.
This disappointment threw a doubt on the eventual success of the work, yet there was still
hope, and the master, in the mean time, undertook all necessary preliminaries at his own cost.
But who could describe his feelings, when, at the taking of Milan by the French, in 1499, his
splendid statue, the fruit of weary study, and of the incessant labour of thirteen years, was used
as a target, by Gascon archers, and maliciously destroyed before his own eyes; and yet the
French at that time marched in the van of civilization. A second restoration was impossible,
in 1500, the Duke was carried a prisoner to France, where, ten years afterwards, he died in
misery. This gigantic undertaking, which the master had twice regarded as accomplished, had
wasted many years of his life.
The last trace of the statue occurs in 1501. Duke Hercules of Ferrara endeavoured, through
his ambassador, to obtain the horse for his own monument, but the French do not seem to have
acceeded to his request, and with this notice all further information is lost. It may be assumed
that Lionardo had produced a wonderful work of art, for he had endeavoured to rival the models
of two preceding generations, Donatello’s Gattamelata in front of the Santo at Padua, and
Verocchio’s “Colleoni.” And he possessed sufficient artistic genius and technical knowledge to
maintain his superiority.
“Inward excitement is strikingly expressed in the countenance of John the Baptist, and
particularly in the expression of the two Pharisees (or rather a Pharisee and a Levite),
who are looking on; in the Levite the feeling is suppressed, but breaks out involuntarily.
The costume belongs rather to the fifteenth century, and recalls the style of Lorenzo Ghiberti,
while the naked form seems worthy of the grand and free style which marks the golden age
of Renaissance.” This opinion of J. Burkhardt may, with justice, be applied to the whole of
Lionardo’s sculpture.
The entire absorption of his time in the equestrian statue may be inferred from the fact,
that until the year 1496, there exists no record of any paintings by his hand. Likenesses of the
Duke, the Duchess and their sons, painted on oil on the wall of the refectory of the Dominican
cloister, have long since crumbled away.
By far the greater number of his pictures have suffered in the lapse of time, from his con-
11*