To many people, Leonardo da Vinci’s Last Supper is THE Last Supper—it is the image that comes to their mind when they picture the great event.
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But what if you are an artist and you want to paint your own Last Supper—something different? Maybe you think you can even improve on Leonardo’s version.
Tintoretto must have looked at Leonardo’s picture and thought like this:
Why did he line his Apostles up so neatly along the table? He seems not to have been able to figure out another way to get all twelve into the picture and show their faces.
Then he was stuck with that long table. But the table means nothing and adds nothing to the drama.
He had to cut all the Apostles off at the middle. I´m going to hide that silly table and show you the Apostles whole. THEY are the subject, after all. I’ll take the same moment of the Bible story as Leonardo did, when Christ has announced that one of the Apostles will betray him, and I’ll let their entire bodies speak. I’ll make it look as though Christ’s words fell like a bomb and floored those Apostles. A painter has to dramatize.And Leonardo’s colors are pretty but they are independent of the theme or moment of the picture. I think light ought to participate in the show, just as it does at the theater. To Leonardo, color is just make-up. But it is an instrument; and rightly employed, it will add a lot to the drama. For example, I’m going to put Judas in the dark: that’s a clever way of pointing to him—right?
And one more thing: what’s all the prettifying—the fine clothes the Apostles are wearing, the linen tablecloth, the palace dining-hall? Weren’t those saints common people? Didn’t they eat ordinary food in a cheap room somewhere? I’ll give them some nice robes for color but I’ll put them in a back room and sit them on cheap stools at a wobbly table.
Here is Tintoretto’s Last Supper in the Church of San Trovaso, Venice
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What did people think of it? For a long time it surprised and shocked them. What vulgar, common details! said John Ruskin. “He has degraded [the Last Supper] to the most ordinary of banquets,” said Jakob Burckhardt, the great nineteenth-century historian. What is that apostle doing reaching for a bottle? And all that troubling movement—the tipped over chair, the theatralics? Where is the solemnity of the event?
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leonardo’s composition is more powerful. The eye is drawn to the central figure with the same lines that depict perspective, a formal feel is created with geometric shapes, mostly rectangles including the table. Movement undulates back and forth from the central figure to the outside figures on both sides of the painting and then back again. He’s managed to represent the flow of ideas and thoughts among the people gathered.
Tintoretto’s composition isn’t bad, but it’s not as good as Leonardo’s. I do like his line of thinking, to place the scene in a more realistic setting, emphasize the human beings and their living conditions. Composition takes on a pyramidal shape and triangles point toward the central figure, but there are some pointing right off the edge of the painting, which lead the eye astray. It’s more chaotic, disorganized, but he was going for this. Overall a nice painting, but not the caliber of Leonaro.
I do visualize the da Vinci as THE last supper. Interesting how we can succumb to propaganda while swearing we are immune to such an influence.
I don’t care for either painting but I think Tintoretto’s piece is a much better design.
I agree with Kimiam, Leonardo’s version is still stronger.
I wish I could see Leonardo’s painting the year he finished it… not the rests of it, as it is now… How to judge the painting, the original Leonardo painting, after THAT?
What I found interesting in Tintoretto’s are the 3 small figure unfinished (2 in the back and one on the stairs) because they could give as an idea about how he painted… But chairs like that? I don’t think so… Jesus and apostles were jews, orientals, I don’t think chairs were known or utilised at the time… Again, books? Maybe Tora but not as a book… I, too, prefer Leonardo’s variant, still. It’s not so “dramatic”, so “moved” but it’s kind of more solemn, more meditative…
Kimiam: Leonardo, like Michelangelo sometimes, carries the geometry a bit far. No wonder Tintoretto wanted to bend the triangles. But I agree that what he comes up with is not as good. Probably what he wanted to do can’t be done: you shouldn’t mess with our a priori requirements of order (though I do see a nice oval in this Last Supper). I saw a big exhibition of his works in Madrid last year and thought most of them had very serious design flaws. How intentional were they? Or was he just bad? He could be very good.
Aryul: What with all the triangles and rectangles and perspective meeting points, Leonardo couldn’t go too far wrong. It’s a shame there’s so little left of the Apostles.
Bill: Now there’s a brave guy!
Danu: There’s a sixth-century painting (a manuscript illustration) of the Last Supper with all of them reclining at the table. The Greeks and Romans reclined at banquets, but I don’t know whether the Jews did. They must have. And the books are a funny anachronism. Don’t painters love to do them?
I was surprised as I had never seen this Last Supper and was struck by how similar it is to Tintoretto’s “Slaughter of the Innocents”. Both have a strong diagonal axis with the light filled exterior in the right quadrant. Such a sense of motion from the lower left to the upper right.
I meant to say that I was surprised by the Tintoretto’s Last Supper.
I like dramatic, so flawed or not, my vote goes for Tintoretto’s version. I’ve never seen it before, and I like it a lot.
I never realized how much I love leonardo. Thank you for posting his work and making me think about it.
Tintoretto- I took a few minutes and looked at other images of his paintings and he has some incredible compositions…I mean totally captivating to me. This one really doesn’t do him much justice. To take one of his (in my opinion)lesser compositions and compare with a great, famous one from well loved artist…that’s a rough ride for anyone.
It’s interesting to read all the comments and see the vote split. Leonardo’s version has no passion in it, the scene is solemn. Even though the figures are in action, they seem static without much emotion. Tintoretto’s scene is almost exploding with so much emotion. Only Christ in the middle looks calm and in control. I love so much movement in every direction, and still the composition is not falling apart. I think Tintoretto did just as well as da Vinci.
Kimiam: I didn’t think I had chosen one of Tintoretto’s minor works for my comparison. A critic writing in the big catalog from the Tintoretto exhibition in Madrid last year called it “a key work in his career, one of the two mature and completely autograph paintings of a theme that is especially associated with [Tintoretto's] name”. I actually thought it was the most “classical” of the Last Suppers I saw by him. I agree with Bill and Erika and Todd that the basic design is good—I just can’t take all the restlessness. The scene reminds me of a third-grade art class with the kids out of control.
I don’t know which works you saw and liked. I’m going to post two more Last Suppers by Tintoretto, just to show everyone how troubling, if original, the guy can be.
Erika: I like drama too but this is soap opera.