From a Studio International online article:
The 200 pages on display at the Queen’s Gallery, Buckingham Palace, have been together since the artist’s death. They were bound by the sculptor Pompeo Leoni in about 1590 and entered the Royal Collection during the reign of Charles II. Some of his most iconic images are here, including his study of a foetus in the womb, made as part of a treatise on anatomy that came close to being finished, but was never published.
Leonardo da Vinci: A Closer Look is a revolutionary re-examination of Leonardo da Vinci’s drawings, of his techniques and of his creative thinking process. It showcases 80 of Leonardo’s finest works on paper from the Royal Collection, using specialist photographic techniques to examine his working practices. One by one, Leonardo’s processes of creation are revealed, from his choice of paper and the composition of the specialist grounds used for his drawings, to his first touches in chalk, ink or metalpoint, and on to the finished compositions.
Many of these features are of course invisible to the naked eye, and have been so for centuries, ever since Leonardo took his pen from the paper. Infrared images reveal underdrawings unseen for 500 years, published here for the first time. Ultraviolet photography brings back to life now-vanished metalpoint sketches; while spectrographic analysis allows us to explore the origin and precise chemistry of Leonardo’s papers and grounds.
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Pencils are discarded, as lighters and umbrellas are, because at some crucial moment they fail in their purpose. They refuse to ignite, quail before a shower, or simply snap. But pencils have merely suspended their usefulness. Their potential still lies within them. They can go on setting down by the thousand the words by which the world works.
Alphonse Mucha, born in Bohemia, came to Paris in 1887. Over the next 8 years, he emerged from obscurity to become the most celebrated graphic designer of the Art Nouveau movement. His intricate designs and gorgeous subjects were so popular that he produced pattern books for fellow designers and students, and his publishers repurposed his advertisements for hundreds of other products.
From our founding in 1929 to the current reimagination of the Museum, MoMA has grown from a bold experiment to New York’s destination for modern and contemporary art. Working with architects Diller Scofidio + Renfro, in collaboration with Gensler, our continued evolution ensures that we always present the most innovative art and meet the changing needs of today’s audiences. To mark this exciting moment, you can explore our history on
“…from Elton John’s albumGoodbye Yellow Brick Road to the Coen brothers’ O Brother, Where Art Thou?, which owes as much to Oz as it does to Homer’s Odyssey. Joel Coen once said: “Every movie ever made is an attempt to remake The Wizard of Oz.” In his 1992 essay about Fleming’s film, Salman Rushdie describes it as his “very first literary influence”. It was one of Derek Jarman’s favourite movies, and among the first he ever saw. (This is the key to its influence: the fact that everyone watches it in childhood. It seeps into your unconscious and stays there.) And there are the spin-offs, sequels and prequels – The Wiz, Return to Oz, Oz the Great and Powerful, Wicked.”