The heretical supper

Transgressions and Anomalies in The Last Supper by Leonardo Da Vinci

Abstract

In sacred theme painting concerning the life of Christ, the Last Supper has a unique history. We will deal with representations of this subject from the 6th century up to Leonardo's 'conclusive' depiction. The theme of the supper intersperses several contents. On the one hand, it recounts the events reported in the Gospels: the question of Judas' betrayal, Christ's washing of the Apostles' feet, the formal birth of the Eucharist and Christ's blessing; on the other hand, it recounts scenes of ancient conviviality such as the act of being together at dinner, it deals with the arrangement of the guests at the table, the assortment of food and furnishings. If we look at the pre-Leonardo dinners, we can see that on the level of doctrine, by far, the most treated issue is that of the identification of Judas, while that of the blessing of bread and wine rarely appears. And suppose this lack of consideration for the pre-eminent religious question is already a transgression, as far as the themes of conviviality are concerned. In that case, we arrive at pictorial and narrative choices that verge on outright heresy. Duccio di Buoninsegna in his dinner of 1308, places a piglet at the centre of the table, while several paintings by the Baschenis present the table cluttered with crayfish and other crustaceans. Both the former and the latter are irreverent choices, to say the least: Christ's supper is during the Jewish Easter holidays, and both foods are forbidden by that religion at all times, even more so at Easter. But the theme of conviviality helps to develop other heretical 'jokes': in the dinner in the Floreffe Abbey Bible of 1170, there are two Christs; in that of John of France of 1437 there are, together with the apostles, the leaders of the fresco. Sometimes there are thirteen apostles, others eleven, with Judas excluded by the author of the painting out of dislike. Then there is the question of the table and its shape, U-shaped, round, rectangular, or sigma-shaped, and the question of the room and its diversity from what is written in the Gospel. The essay will present a detailed case study of the main departures from scripture proposed by artists who have reworked the theme with a freedom that is sometimes heretical and always intriguing. Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)