Fresco

Experimental archaeology and the investigation of the methods, materials and techniques of fresco wall-paintings, In Souyoudzoglou-Haywood, Christina, O'Sullivan, Aidan, (Eds.), Experimental Archaeology: Making, Understanding, Story-telling, Proceedings of a Workshop in Experimental Archaeology, Irish Institute of Hellenic Studies at Athens with UCD Centre for Experimental Archaeology and Material Culture, Dublin, Athens, 14th-15th October 2017, Oxford: Archaeopress Archaeology, pp. 93-105.

Nicholas Eckstein's Painted Glories: The Brancacci Chapel in Renaissance Florence extricates this intensely studied monument from preoccupations characteristic of traditional art history: patronage, connoisseurship, style, conservation history, technique, and materials. This is notable because all these topics have prompted an extensive scholarship. Giorgio Vasari oriented the chapel to the future and drew a line from the Brancacci frescoes to those by Michelangelo at the Sistine chapel, marking a new tradition of excellence and modernity in Florentine art. Eckstein's orientation is to the past, and his goal is to understand the chapel as an expression of the multifaceted identity of the Carmelite order in Florence well before the painting of the mesmerizing frescoes in the 1420s and 1480s. His chapters seek to reconstruct not only the (much­altered) church of Santa Maria del Carmine as it stood in the fifteenth century but also the neighborhood around it. Felice Brancacci, patron of the decorative program, appears as an early focal point, but the book progressively widens its lens to consider the chapel as the possession of many communities. Eckstein does not attempt to penetrate the walls of the chapel and explore a new spatial clarity and psychological intensity in narrative painting. Rather, his analysis encompasses a wide range of ways that contemporaries approached, regarded, and used the chapel. The Brancacci chapel is for him a means to gain insight into the spiritual life of San Frediano, a gritty, working­class neighborhood, and the frescoes are the product of monks and artisans, patrician families, and widows of modest means. In fact the book's title does not reference the frescoes at all, but is rather a metaphor Felice Brancacci used to describe the Sultan's court in Cairo. The first chapter traces the origins and history of the Carmelite order in Florence and highlights the status of Peter as the apostle to whom contemporaries looked as an exemplar of bedrock faith but also fear and self­doubt. Eckstein reconstructs the interior of the Carmine chapel by chapel as a network of devotional micro­zones, with a fine­ grained attention to family patronage. The modern tourist makes a beeline for the Masaccio frescoes through a separate entrance. Eckstein is at pains to demonstrate how deeply imbricated the Brancacci chapel was within the interior of the Carmine, where many sacred spaces interpenetrated and overlapped. While the Carmelites could not ask for a clearer symbolic expression of their deep identification with the Roman papacy, the Brancacci frescoes also operated within an elitist ideology of leading citizens asserting their authority and control. Eckstein argues, not altogether persuasively, that the compelling scenes of Peter healing the sick and ministering to the socially marginal would have been for the Brancacci a reassuring alternative to the threat of social chaos and revolt. Virtues of the book—its widely dispersed attention and refusal to grant a privileged voice to the artists, order, or the patron in generating meaning—also hamper the advancement of a propulsive and coherent argument. Major claims about how the Brancacci frescoes must have functioned within the cultural imaginary of Florence in the turbulent 1420s startlingly appear at the end of the first chapter but seem disembodied and poorly founded in the shadowy figure of Felice Brancacci, as if they have wandered in from another kind of book. The abrupt swerve into a hard­edged, socially oppositional interpretive mode of setting the frescoes against their orthodox Christian iconography departs as suddenly as it arrives, and the book resumes its stately pace and broad­based texture.

A discussion of the theme of papal primacy in Michelangelo's fresco Last Judgment in the Sistine Chapel in Rome and how the artist worked to convey this message. Contrary to much published opinion, this fresco cannot be taken merely as expressing a single artist's vision, but instead should be viewed as the culminating statement of papal propaganda in the Sistine Chapel, which continues the message of papal primacy begun by Pope Sixtus IV in the early 1480s. Michelangelo's fresco, together with the chapel's earlier decoration, was commissioned to propagate specific ideas about the Second Coming and the Catholic Church's part in this climactic event. An examination of why a Last Judgment was commissioned and why certain iconographic choices were made in the grand composition's development supports the argument that the fresco conveys an inherently positive and triumphal message, rather than being a gloomy and frightening image that reflects insecurities spawned within the papal court by the Sack of Rome.

Researches which were conducted by different scientists in the Central Asia in different periods made important contributions with regard to enlightening the period. Examinations made by A.Grünwedel, A.Von Le Coq and et al. in Murtuk, Khocho, Kucha, Kumtura, Sorçuk, Tumshuk, Yar-hoto, Bezeklik especially between 1902 and 1914 have enabled us to get information about cave temples and wall drawings, to understand stylistic features of the period. Starting from Kök Türk period, Buddhist belief which was effective in Turkish art and affected Uighur painting too and especially wall drawings reached to the peak in it. In our study, examples from wall paintings which were found as a result of works the German researchers made in the region and which were taken to Berlin were handled according to historical chronology.

Доклад «’’Звенигородский чин” прп. Андрея Рублева: современные проблемы изучения» на III Чтениях памяти В.А. Плугина на историческом факультете МГУ 14 ноября 2017 г.  В докладе полностью доказана по данным всего комплекса источников неоспоримая принадлежность знаменитого «Звенигородского чина» кисти великого иконописца прп. Андрея Рублева († 17.10.1428). Тем самым начисто развенчаны легковесные мнения молодых сотрудников ГТГ Л.В. Нерсесяна и С.В. Свердловой (поддержанных только А.М. Лидовым), прозвучавшие на круглом столе в Третьяковской галерее 21 июня 2017 г., что «Звенигородский чин» 1396 г. якобы не был написан прп. Андреем Рублевым и отличается от его общепризнанных икон, таких, как чудотворная икона «Живоначальная Троица». Такие незрелые суждения не соответствуют уровню современного научного знания об этих шедеврах и обусловлены недостаточной осведомленностью авторов «сенсации» о творческой биографии всемирно известного иконописца Древней Руси, которая взята ими для корреляции: «получается, что Рублев, будучи еще совсем молодым мастером, создал одно из самых совершенных и сложных по технике произведений древнерусской живописи, но через четверть века по какой-то неизвестной причине радикальным образом изменил свою манеру» (Софья Свердлова).
Доклад проф. О.Г. Ульянова, заведующего Сектором церковной археологии ФГБУК «Центральный музей древнерусской культуры и искусства имени прп. Андрея Рублева», подготовлен на базе научно-исследовательского проекта «Преподобный Андрей Рублев в Спасо-Андрониковом монастыре».

บทความนี้มุ่งวิเคราะห์ภาพจิตรกรรมฝาผนังสีปูนแห้งแสดงฉากพระราชกรณียกิจการเลิกทาสของพระบาทสมเด็จพระจุลจอมเกล้าเจ้าอยู่หัว (รัชกาลที่ 5) ภายในพระที่นั่งอนันตสมาคม ในฐานะของการเป็นภาพแทนเหตุการณ์ทางประวัติศาสตร์ดังกล่าวที่อยู่ในความทรงจำร่วมของคนไทย ภาพสีปูนแห้งแสดงฉากพระราชกรณียกิจเลิกทาสจากเดิมที่เคยเป็นภาพเฉลิมพระเกียรติราชวงศ์จักรีตกแต่งเพดานโค้งครึ่งวงกลมภายในพระที่นั่งอนันตสมาคม ซึ่งเกือบจะเป็นสถานที่ปิด แทบไม่เปิดให้สาธารณชนได้เข้าชม ได้ถูกผลิตซ้ำในรูปแบบที่กระจายทั่วถึงและเข้าถึงได้ง่าย เช่น ธนบัตร และสแตมป์ เป็นกลวิธีที่ทั้งเป็นผลกระทบจากความทรงจำร่วมในสังคมไทย และต่อยอดหรือตอกย้ำให้ความทรงจำร่วมรวมทั้งการผลิตซ้ำยังคงมีต่อไป ในประเด็นหลังนี้ บทความได้มองภาพเลิกทาสในฐานะผลผลิตของประวัติศาสตร์นิพนธ์อันมีศูนย์กลางอยู่ที่ราชสำนักหรือราชวงศ์จักรี ความสำคัญของผู้สร้างคือรัชกาลที่ 5 ทำให้ภาพมีความหมายเชิงสัญลักษณ์ตั้งแต่กระบวนการสร้างในบริบทของการหยิบยืมประติมานวิทยาแบบจักรวรรดินิยมจากตะวันตกเพื่อนำมาเสริมสร้างพระเกียรติยศ พระราชอำนาจและหน้าที่ของการเป็นพระมหากษัตริย์ไทยในยุคต้นสมัยใหม่ที่มีแรงบันดาลใจจากตะวันตกเป็นแรงขับเคลื่อนของการเปลี่ยนแปลงและพัฒนา และการเป็นภาพสัญลักษณ์ของการเป็นผู้มอบอิสรภาพให้กับประชาชนอันเป็นหนึ่งในพระมหากรุณาธิคุณที่สังคมไทยในปัจจุบันเทิดทูนต่อรัชกาลที่ 5
The fresco depicting the scene of King Chulalongkorn’s abolition of slavery which decorates the south transept’s apse of the Ananta Samakhom Throne Hall is a visual representation of Thailand’s abolition of slavery. Initially the fresco was rarely seen by the public due to its location as the throne hall. However when the 100th anniversary of the abolition of slavery occurred in 2005, the fresco was reproduced in a form of a motif on 100 baht banknote and 3 baht postage stamp. This reproduction of the mostly unseen fresco strongly reflects a symbolic importance of the image to which this paper aims to discuss at length. Collective memory of the Thais toward King Chulalongkorn undeniably plays a crucial role in the way in which the fresco is perceived. There are two main issues that need to be explored. Firstly, as King Chulalongkorn’s western aspiration is clear in his development programs as well as his personal taste, hence this painting is inherently a product of yet another King Chulalongkorn’s westernization. The paper specifically proposes the fresco was executed by way of imperial iconography appropriation. By creating symbolic meaning in political realm, the abolition of slavery fresco has thus become a commemoration of the event and of the King which led to the second purpose of this paper. In answering the question as to why this particular image is politically significant, this paper aims to investigate the fresco as a product of collective memory as part of a machination of commemorative practice within a wider scale of national history.

Compares the underdrawings of the Badia Fiorentina's cloister frescoes with their finished paintings to reveal collaboration between Fra Angelico as designer and several assistants as executors. Through technical and documentary analysis, this article offers a solution to the long-standing dispute over the murals’ authorship and changes our understanding of Fra Angelico’s early career. Focusing on how the early 15th-century murals decorating the cloister of the Florentine Badia with scenes from the life of St Benedict were made allows new insights into who made them. Scholars have long separated the murals into two distinct groups, but by seeking a single artistic personality for each group, they have overlooked the collaborative nature of Renaissance fresco production and the realities of Florentine workshop practice. A reappraisal of the documentary evidence shows that Giovanni di Consalvo, to whom one of the groups is usually attributed, was, at most, a minor workshop assistant on the Badia project. A closer look at the larger group and the frescoes' sinopia underdrawings indicates that they were not the work of a single master, but rather the creations of a workshop team, most probably supervised by Fra Angelico.

Alors que les principaux ensembles iconographiques de Saint-Savin-sur-Gartempe sont bien connus et ont donné lieu à une importante bibliographie, de nombreux aspects considérés comme secondaires ont été négligés. Si l'on s'est toujours accordé à penser que la technique de ces peintures à fond clair datées des environs de 1100 était la fresque, on a peu cherché à regarder de plus près la mise en oeuvre du décor et, d'une façon plus globale, à en établir l'authenticité en identiant clairement les interventions de la fin du Moyen Âge et les reprises du XIX e siècle. Lors de la dernière campagne de restauration de la nef de l'abbatiale (2005-2008), l'équipe Peintures Murales du CÉSCM a lancé une étude interdisciplinaire avec la collaboration des services de l'État, des restaurateurs et des chercheurs du LRMH. Ce programme visait plus particulièrement une identication des techniques utilisées, la proposition d'un résumé graphique des différents stades d'élaboration des peintures, la détermination d'une chronologie relative des décors de la nef et une révision approfondie de l'iconographie et du style. Certaines scènes soulevant des questions d'ordre iconographique ou archéologique ont donc été choisies pour être relevées. À l'issue de la phase de terrain rendue possible par la présence d'échafaudages, les observations ont considérablement renouvelé la compréhension des peintures, tant sur des aspects techniques que stylistiques ou iconographiques. Deux campagnes de construction différentes sont à l'origine du désaxement de la nef qui compte un seul niveau d'élévation constitué par de grandes arcades de profil en plein-cintre. En conséquence, l'éclairage provenant des baies des collatéraux très hauts voûtés d'arêtes est indirect. À l'ouest, les trois premières travées se trouvent dans le prolongement du porche ; elles sont subdivisées par des piles composées et couvertes par un berceau en plein-cintre scandé par des arcs doubleaux. Les six autres travées inscrites dans l'axe du chevet et du transept sont rythmées par deux files de colonnes et couvertes par une voûte en berceau continu qui souligne le caractère longitudinal de cet espace.

Tesi di laurea triennale, università Ca' Foscari di Venezia
A partire dagli anni Sessanta del Settecento, Giandomenico Tiepolo si dedicò, a più riprese, alla decorazione della sua proprietà di famiglia, la villa di Zianigo. Nell'intimità di quel luogo, senza una committenza a imporgli un soggetto, lasciò scorrere libera la propria fantasia, dipingendo satiri e centauri, scene mitologiche e scene di vita nobiliare contemporanea, fino alla comparsa dei Pulcinella. Questi irrompono sulle pareti della villa impetuosi, per non abbandonare più Giandomenico fino ai suoi ultimi giorni di vita. Infatti, Pulcinella ritornerà anche nella sua opera Divertimento per li regazzi, una raccolta di disegni con la sgraziata maschera come protagonista. Questa tesi vuole andare a indagare sulle ragioni che hanno portato Giandomenico Tiepolo a scegliere proprio la maschera di Pulcinella fra tutte le altre. Saranno approfondite dunque motivazioni di tipo politico, chiarendo il grado di coinvolgimento dell’artista negli accadimenti storici di Venezia, ma anche di tipo sociale, in quanto Pulcinella fa la sua comparsa nell'opera dell’artista in un momento in cui la nobiltà affrontava il proprio declino, per lasciare spazio alla borghesia. Anche dal punto di vista artistico Pulcinella si colloca in un periodo in cui lo stile rococò, prediletto da Giandomenico e suo padre, non era più acclamato dal pubblico, in quanto il neoclassicismo si stava già affacciando sul mondo dell’arte.

The parish church of St James the Greater in Želiezovce (Hungarian: Zselíz) belongs
to the bishopric of Nitra and is situated in southern Slovakia. This book presents the first
monograph on the medieval church and its fourteenth- and fifteenth-century wall
paintings, with a primary focus on the peculiar iconography of these murals. Ultimately,
through highlighting the importance of the Scala Salutis fresco as the first monumental
adaptation of a peculiar iconographical type which became wide-spread across the
continent, my inquiry suggests that Slovakia was more firmly integrated into artistic
networks across Europe than has previously been supposed.

Stredoveké nástenné maľby Kostola svätého Jakuba staršieho v Želiezovciach (in Slovak, with English summary), Rožňava: Georgius Bubek, 2018. pp. 188, ISBN: 978-80-972888-1-5.

The optics drawing system called linear perspective is a technique widely known as developed during the Italian Renaissance in 1413 by Fillippo Brunelleschi. Other influential men of the same context have claimed to be the inventors of perspective. The perspective drawing system of optics whereby a three dimensional environment can be depicted on a two dimensional plane was known and used well before the Renaissance. As proof we can see the perspective technique used before the dates of August 25 , 79 AD in the ancient cities of Herculaneum and Pompeii. The ancient murals preserved from a burial of volcanic ash depict a perspective technique. Many nineteenth and twentieth century philosophers have argued that roman murals in the second style are not perspective. This paper is meant to begin to clarify how the ancient fresco muralist used the drawing system of perspective optics well before the supposed invention in 1413.

The Kaisersaal of the formerly princely Residence of Würzburg was commissioned by prince-bishop Friedrich Carl von Schönborn (1729 – 46) and was built at his time by Balthasar Neumann. But it was the successor prince-bishop Carl Philipp von Greiffenclau (1749 – 54) who hired Giovanni Battista Tiepolo in order to decorate this magnificent room with huge frescos; these frescos represent not only the glory of the duchy of Franconia as a key part of the Holy Roman Empire. They are also a painted monument paying homage to the two electors of the Greiffenclau dynasty and grand-fathers of Carl Philipp: Richard, elector and archbishop of Treves and Georg Friedrich, elector and archbishop of Mayence. Indeed, the frescos contain two hitherto unknown portraits of these famous ancestors of Carl Philipp, which are masterpieces and do throw new light on G. B. Tiepolo as a major portraitist of his time.

Alanya Castle, whose foundations date back to Hellenistic times, is considered as a medieval fortress built by the Anatolian Seljuks and is considered one of the symbols of Alanya today. It was used as the winter capital during the Seljuk period and its name was changed to Alaiye as Kalonoros, referring to the name of the conqueror, Alaeddin Keykubad. The city was surrounded by the walls we saw today, with the orders of the Conqueror and was supported with various towers, especially the Red tower and as a port city with its shipyard, it became the window of the Anatolian Seljuks to the Mediterranean.
Today, when we examine the walls and gates of Alanya Castle, which consists of gray stone blocks and plasters, we see that they are not composed of gray stone blocks and plasters. Plastered and painted decorations that have remained in small remnants due to natural wear and human damage, must have been adorned in a spectacular way during the period of Anatolian Seljuks. The walls and gates of Alanya Castle, where zigzag, checkerboard, shield, animal and various geometric ornaments are applied, reflects the aesthetic taste and iconographic understanding of the period. When we compare these decorations, which are mostly concentrated in the periphery of doors and bastions, to other structures and various works of art, we will have a more accurate result.

Il presente elaborato tenta una contestualizzazione dal punto di vista storico-artistico del ciclo di affreschi con le Storie di Diana e Atteone eseguito dal Parmigianino (1503-1540) in una saletta del castello di Fontanellato, verosimilmente fra il 1523 e il 1524. A partire da un’analisi del dato stilistico, si sono tratteggiati i principali riferimenti – da Mantegna al Correggio, da Leonardo al Pordenone – che giocarono un ruolo decisivo nella formazione del linguaggio del giovane artista, così come si mostra tanto a Fontanellato quanto nelle opere del primo periodo parmense. Attraverso lo studio della committenza e la valutazione delle principali interpretazioni iconologiche, si è cercato inoltre di dare conto del significato cifrato e sfuggente del ciclo. Si è infine evocata la diffusione di quel tipo di decorazioni a soggetto mitologico nelle corti padane, sottolineando come la stratificazione di significati, fra allegorici, religiosi e morali, tenuti insieme dalla cultura umanistica, dimostri la volontà di una piccola corte di allinearsi ai cenacoli culturali più aggiornati.

Bu çalışmada Bizans İmparatorluğu’ndan günümüze ulaşmayı başaran önemli bir yapı olan Khora Manastırı Katholikonu’nun resim programı üslup ve ikonografi açısıdan incelenmiştir. İstanbul’da bulunan yapı İ.S. IV. yüzyılda din şehidi Aziz Babylas’ın ve yoldaşlarının defnedilmesiyle bir gömü yeri olarak önem kazanan arazi üzerine kurulmuştur. Çeşitli yapım evreleri ve onarımlar geçiren yapı bu günkü haline Palailogoslar Rönesans’ı olarak adlandırdığımız dönemde Baş Logothes olarak görev yapmış olan Theodoros Metokhites’in bâniliğinde gerçekleşen 1316 ile 1320 yılları arasındaki yeniden inşa süreci sonrasında kavuşmuştur. 1453 Yılında Osmanlı İmparatorluğu’nun Konstantinopolis’i fethetmesinin ardından yapı cami olarak kullanılmıştır. Yapı içerisindeki mozaik ve freskler badana ile gözlerden gizlenmişse de bazı tasvirler ahşap kapaklarla örtülerek gerektiğinde ziyaretçilere açılmıştır. Cumhuriyet döneminde Amerika Bizans Enstitüsünün yaptığı restorasyon çalışmaları sonucu gizlenen resim programı açığa çıkartılmıştır. Bugün müze olarak kullanılan yapı Kariye Müzesi olarak anılmaktadır.
Tek mekânlı bir naosa sahip yapı eksonarteks, esonarteks, parekklesion ve kuzeydeki iki katlı birimden (annex) meydana gelir. Naostaki resim programı sınırlı ölçüde günümüze ulaşabilmiştir. Eksonarteks bölümünde İsa’nın yaşamından ve mucizelerinden sahneler yer alırken esonarteks kısmında Meryem’in İncilde yer almayan yaşamından sahneler ve İsa’nın mucizelerinin yanı sıra deesis ve soy çevrimi gibi ikonalar yer alır. Parekklesion bölümünde ise dolaylı ve dolaysız olarak Meryem ağırlıklı bir tema hakimdir. Ayrıca Anastasis ve son yargı parekklesion bölümünün temasında belirleyici unsurdur.
Mevcut resim programı Kutsal Kitap öykülerine atıfta bulunurken bir yandan da Theodoros Metokhites’in mimar ile resim sanatçılarının bir arada çalışmasına olanak vermesi sonucu ökaristi ayinine, cenaze ritüeline ve akathistos ilahisine gönderme yapar. Ayrıca resim programı anıtsal ölçüde eski ahit sahneleri barındırması yönünden de önem taşır.
Kompozisyonlarda normalde birbirinden bağımsız unsurlar, düzensiz boşlukları doldurmak için oldukça değiştirilmiş halde dekorasyon ile birleşmiştir. Mimari arka fonlar sahne dekoru gibidir. Kumaşlar, bitkiler ve rastgele ayrıntılarla doludur. Eğilim kompozisyonun dağılmasına doğrudur; denge önemsizdir ve yerini asimetri, istikrarsızlık ve huzursuzluk almıştır. Figürler tuhaf kıvrımlı pozlara sahiptirler ve bazen ayakları yere sağlam basmaz.

This dissertation investigates the Orange Cloister of the Badia Fiorentina -- a Benedictine abbey located in central Florence. Between 1428 and 1441, this cloister was built and decorated with mural paintings depicting the Life of St. Benedict. Despite their position in one of the oldest and richest Florentine ecclesiastical institutions, these murals are not included in general surveys of Italian Renaissance painting for lack of an accepted author. However, they survive as a rare example of progressive Florentine mural decoration painted during the decade following the death of Masaccio. Rather than its authorship, this investigation begins with questions of the mural program’s function and reception, creating a framework where issues of architectural setting, iconography, historical context, patronage, and style are integrated to present a more extensive and satisfying interpretation of the paintings.

A review of the literature demonstrates how previous studies of the Orange Cloister focus on issues of authorship, as historians have discussed either the cloister’s construction and responsible architect or its mural program and painter. This dissertation examines the entire complex, remedying the artificial division between architectural and art history. Analyzing the extant building fabric, documentary evidence -- much published here for the first time, and other primary sources, this study aims to reconstruct the cloister’s fifteenth-century appearance and function. A discussion of the patron, Abbot Gomezio di Giovanni, explains how the cloister complex formed an integral part of his reform program initiated at the monastery in 1419. Issues of architectural authorship are also addressed to question the validity of historians’ attempts to identify the cloister’s “architect.” Similarly, art historians have struggled with the authorship of the cloister’s murals. A review of documentary, circumstantial, and stylistic evidence suggests that the Life of St. Benedict cycle was produced by two teams of artists, who included the documented, much-debated, and poorly understood Portuguese painter Giovanni di Consalvo. Stylistic and iconographic analysis clarifies the relationship between the Badia cycle and its textual and pictorial sources to show how the murals served Gomezio’s institutional reforms by expressing themes crucial to the abbot and his monastic community.

Il lavoro, parte di uno studio sulla chiesa di San Giovanni al Sepolcro a Brindisi, analizza la produzione pittorica trecentesca della chiesa attraverso la rilettura analitica di ogni pannello e lo studio delle stratigrafie murarie, apportando nuove e inedite interpretazioni delle scene cristologiche e dei santi presenti nell'invaso, oltre che una più corretta datazione degli stessi.

This article will demonstrate how the Salvator Mundi, a work recently sold by Christie's New York for $450 million and said to be by Leonardo da Vinci, cannot have been conceived as an easel painting, to be most normally hung or viewed at eye level. It will be shown that experts' first impressions of this previously unknown work became more important to them than an obligation to scientifically answer to all its difficulties and anomalies. The very obvious distortions in this half-representation of Christ – the mismatched eyes, the too long nose, the elongated face with seemingly Byzantine proportions, the different sized hands and the too small shoulders – were not accidents or medieval references, but designed by the artist as an anamorphosis. I discovered that seen from the correct angle, that is, as if the work was placed over a door and viewed upwards slightly from the left, the perspective adjusts to a perfectly proportioned and elegant portrait. The subject's eyes line up and even out, the nose and face shorten, the shoulders enlarge, and the left hand corrects to the scale of the raised right hand, appearing to reach out and offer the crystal orb to the viewer. From an oblique fixed position the image pops and takes on a three dimensionality, an optical illusion of perfect perspective. The reconstituted image is surely now Christ the Redeemer; a fresco by Leonardo thought to have been destroyed around 1600 when a door it was placed over was enlarged. It was found in the same convent in Milan as his Last Supper. The design was never intended to be seen at eye level, or to be photographed face on. A fallacious image has, therefore, gone viral, posted by experts who failed to see the anamorphic design in the Salvator Mundi, or to understand Leonardo's compositional ingenuity.