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Print on handmade Amalfi paper
Size: 29 x 42 cm (11.4 x 16.5 in)
Material: artwork printed on very fine handmade Amalfi paper with deckled edges
Frame: light brown beech wood, handmade

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The artwork

Adoration of the Magi 1481-82

Charcoal, watercolour, ink and oil on panel, 244 x 240 cm (96.1 x 94.5 in)

Uffizi Gallery, Florence

Since early Christian times, 6 January has been celebrated as the feast of the Epiphany, the appearance of God among men in the form of Jesus Christ. Humanity is represented by the Three Kings, who pay homage to the Messiah. His appearance also marked the beginning of the fall of the pagan world.

Leonardo seems to have depicted this moment, so dramatic in the history of humanity, in his panel. It remained unfinished because Leonardo left Florence and moved to Milan, although we do not know why. Chemical reactions and dirt now make it difficult to read this fascinating panel in detail. With this painting Leonardo declares his independence from Verrocchio, emerging with a fresh and personal style.

Although unfinished, this painting is far more innovative than his earlier works. The composition is built around a central, pyramidal group of figures and, more significantly, Leonardo here incorporates light and shade into the underdrawing of the painting. Even though the panel remained unfinished, the Adoration of the Magi, with its symmetrically composed main group, unlike the traditional linear composition, is today considered one of the most progressive works of Florentine painting.

It puts into practice the demands that Alberti made of history paintings in a way that no other work of its time does. All the figures are involved in the events depicted in the picture. The illustrious kings show their emotions in a more dignified manner than the figures accompanying them, and the overall number of participants is kept within bounds.

The figures are grouped in a circle around Mary and express, with more or less vigorous gestures, their emotion at the first manifestation of the divinity of the Christ Child. The painting also differs from the traditional Florentine way of depicting the Adoration in its enigmatic background scenes, the equestrian battles and an unfinished staircase.

This has led to the supposition that the Augustinian monastery of San Donato a Scopeto, which commissioned the painting, wished to use this pictorial composition to convey its own theological interpretation of the theme of the Adoration.