page_title: Salvator Mundi (Leonardo)
section_title: Partial attribution
hierarchical_section_title: Salvator Mundi (Leonardo) / Attribution / Partial attribution
caption_attribution_description: Leonardo da Vinci, Salvator Mundi. The painting was sold at Christie's New York, November 15, 2017, for $450.3 million, making it the most expensive painting ever sold.
context_page_description: Salvator Mundi is a painting by Italian Renaissance artist Leonardo da Vinci dated to c. 1500. Long thought to be a copy of a lost original veiled with overpainting, it was rediscovered, restored, and included in a major Leonardo exhibition at the National Gallery, London, in 2011–12. Although most leading scholars have considered it to be an original work by Leonardo, this attribution has been disputed by other specialists, some of whom posit that he only contributed certain elements.
  The painting depicts Jesus in Renaissance dress, making the sign of the cross with his right hand, while holding a transparent, non-refracting crystal orb in his left, signaling his role as Salvator Mundi and representing the 'celestial sphere' of the heavens. Around 20 other variations of the work are known, by students and followers of Leonardo. Preparatory chalk and ink drawings of the drapery by Leonardo are held in the British Royal Collection.
  It is one of fewer than 20 known works by Leonardo, and was the only one to remain in a private collection.
context_section_description: Some respected experts on Renaissance art question the full attribution of the painting to Leonardo. Jacques Franck, a Paris-based art historian and Leonardo specialist who has studied the Mona Lisa out of the frame multiple times, stated: "The composition doesn't come from Leonardo, he preferred twisted movement. It's a good studio work with a little Leonardo at best, and it's very damaged. It's been called 'the male Mona Lisa', but it doesn't look like it at all."
  Michael Daley, the director of ArtWatch UK, doubts the Salvator Mundi's authenticity and theorizes that it may be the prototype of a subject painted by Leonardo: "This quest for an autograph prototype Leonardo painting might seem moot or vain: not only do the two drapery studies comprise the only accepted Leonardo material that might be associated with the group, but within the Leonardo literature there is no documentary record of the artist ever having been involved in such a painting project."
  Carmen Bambach, Italian Renaissance art specialist at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, questioned full attribution to Leonardo: "having studied and followed the picture during its conservation treatment, and seeing it in context in the National Gallery exhibition, much of the original painting surface may be by Boltraffio, but with passages done by Leonardo himself, namely Christ's proper right blessing hand, portions of the sleeve, his left hand and the crystal orb he holds." In 2019, Dr. Bambach criticised Christie's for its claim that she was one of the experts who had attributed the painting to Leonardo. In her forthcoming book Leonardo da Vinci Rediscovered, she is even more specific, attributing most of the work to Boltraffio, "with only 'small retouchings' by the master himself".
  Matthew Landrus, an art historian at the University of Oxford agreed with the concept of parts of the painting being executed by Leonardo ("between 5 and 20%"), but attributes the painting to Leonardo's studio assistant Bernardino Luini, noting Luini's ability in painting gold tracery.
  Frank Zöllner, the author of the catalogue raisonné Leonardo da Vinci. The Complete Paintings and Drawings. writes:
  This attribution is controversial primarily on two grounds. Firstly, the badly damaged painting had to undergo very extensive restoration, which makes its original quality extremely difficult to assess. Secondly, the Salvator Mundi in its present state exhibits a strongly developed sfumato technique that corresponds more closely to the manner of a talented Leonardo pupil active in the 1520s than to the style of the master himself. The way in which the painting was placed on the market also gave rise to concern.
  Zöllner also explains that the quality of Salvator Mundi surpasses other known versions, however,
  [it] also exhibits a number of weaknesses. The flesh tones of the blessing hand, for example, appear pallid and waxen as in a number of workshop paintings. Christ's ringlets also seem to me too schematic in their execution, the larger drapery folds too undifferentiated, especially on the right-hand side. ... It will probably only be possible to arrive at a more informed verdict on this question after the results of the painting's technical analyses have been published in full (Dalivalle/Kemp/Simon 2017).
  In Paris, the Louvre's request for Salvator Mundi to be exhibited in the 2019–20 Leonardo de Vinci exhibition was reportedly met without response, leading some to speculate that its non-presence was due to doubts over its full attribution to the artist. Kemp disputes this reasoning, saying:
  It's simply untrue ... because even if the Louvre was persuaded that there was studio participation in the picture, which would be feasible and not unknown after all, it wouldn't stop them from showing it. It's a major picture, an important thing. The story is sensationalized and inaccurate.
caption: Over-cleaning resulted in abrasion over the entire painting, especially in the face and hair.[81] Above Christ's left eye (right) are visible marks that the artist made to soften the flesh with the heel of his hand.[8]
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