Cenacolo Vinciano

Leonardo da Vinci's Last Supper fills the end wall of the refectory of Santa Maria delle Grazie. Its experimental technique doomed it almost from the first strokes; the mural that survives is the product of five centuries of care, and among the most fragile masterpieces in Europe.

Why it matters

Painted between about 1495 and 1498 for Ludovico Sforza, the mural captures the moment after Christ announces that one of the apostles will betray him, each figure reacting in a distinct gesture. Leonardo refused true fresco, which demands speed, and instead painted in tempera on a wall sealed with gesso, pitch and mastic so he could work slowly and revise. The technique gave him the luminosity he wanted and doomed the painting: deterioration began almost immediately after its completion in February 1498. That you can stand before it at all is the result of five centuries of interventions, culminating in the 21-year restoration by Pinin Brambilla Barcilon unveiled in 1999. The refectory is part of the UNESCO World Heritage inscription that also covers the church and convent of Santa Maria delle Grazie.

What to notice

The four groups of three apostles form a wave of reaction that moves outwards from Christ. Notice the painted architecture — coffered ceiling, tapestries, windows opening onto a Lombard landscape — which extends the real refectory space, designed so that the monks eating below felt the scene occupied the room's end wall. On the opposite wall, do not miss Montorfano's Crucifixion fresco, painted a few years earlier and, perversely, better preserved. The doorway cut through the picture in 1652 removed Christ's feet; early painted copies by Giampietrino and others preserve what is lost, and knowing this helps you read the damage as history rather than simply as loss.

Context and history

Ludovico Sforza conceived the refectory decoration as part of a wider plan to make Santa Maria delle Grazie a Sforza mausoleum; his wife Beatrice was buried in the church in 1497. The mural's misfortunes are a catalogue of modern history: as early as 1499 the French king Louis XII was already contemplating detaching the whole wall and carrying it to France; humidity and the experimental technique caused early flaking; a doorway was cut through it; a protective curtain trapped moisture; the refectory was used as a stable; and on 15 August 1943 Allied bombing destroyed the refectory's roof and one wall while sandbagging saved the painting's wall from splinters. Restorers worked on the mural repeatedly across the nineteenth and twentieth centuries before the landmark 1978-1999 campaign removed overpaint and recovered Leonardo's original surface. Since 3 December 2024 the museum has been managed by the Pinacoteca di Brera as part of a planned Milanese museum hub.