The Italian Cultural Institute in Helsinki is organising an online meeting on Leonardo’s and Bramante’s works at Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan, on Thursday 11 November. Those behind the meeting, to be held in Italian on a Zoom platform (from 17:00 to 18:00), are the Politecnico di Milano and Turku University. The event will be introduced by Antonio Sciacovelli (Turku University).
The Santa Maria delle Grazie church and Dominican convent that house Leonardo da Vinci’s “Last Supper” have been one of the sites declared to be a Unesco World Heritage Site for many years, not only due to the presence of one of the best known works of the genius Italian artist, but for the entire complex that still shows the original bond between the architecture of this church and convent and the works of art they house. This action aims to valorise the uniqueness of this site that, over the last decade of the 15th century, was at the heart of Ludovico Maria Sforza’s interest, with the intent of turning it into his mausoleum. To this end, two of Italy’s leading Renaissance artists were called in to work there: Donato Bramante, who designed the new monumental apse of the church, and Leonardo da Vinci, involved in painting a work on the north wall of the convent’s refectory, that was to revolutionise the history of painting, from both an iconographic and a technical point of view. Despite the damage suffered during World War II, the church, the cloister of the frogs with its monumental sacristy, and the convent’s refectory are excellently preserved, in part thanks to restoration on the complex over the years.
The meeting will involve Jessica Gritti, a Doctor of research into the History of architecture and town planning at Venice’s IUAV University, and lecturer at Politecnico di Milano and the Università Cattolica. Since 2008 she has been involved in research and teaching at the Department of Architecture and Urban Studies at Politecnico di Milano, working particularly on constructing and coordinating a Corpus of architectural drawings of the Cathedral in Milan, and the biographical dictionary of architects and engineers in Milan (15th-18th centuries). She has also worked with various institutions, including the Bagatti Valsecchi Museum in Milan, the Ambrosian Library, and the National Gallery in London. Her research focusses mainly on the 15th and 16th centuries: her most recent studies deal with Lombard architectural culture from the Sforza era and the early 14th century, architectural drawings, clients, and Florentine architects in Milan, Donato Bramante’s works in Lombardy, and the ties between architecture and the visual arts.
To take part in the meeting, book via:
