Bambach attributes most of the picture Salvator Mundi to Leonardo’s assistant, Giovanni Antonio Boltraffio

Nikola Benin, Ph.D

 

One of the world’s leading experts on Leonardo da Vinci has criticised Christie’s auction house for wrongly suggesting in its cataloguing of the Salvator Mundi that she was among scholars who had attributed the picture to the Renaissance master.

Dr Carmen Bambach, who is a curator at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, told the Guardian: “That is not representative of my opinion.”

In 2008, she had been among scholars invited by the National Gallery in London to view the painting. In 2017, Christie’s New York sold it for a record-breaking $450m (£356m), having listed her in its cataloguing as among scholars whose “study and examination of the painting … resulted in a broad consensus that the Salvator Mundi was painted by Leonardo”.

But, in her forthcoming four-volume study of the polymath – a vast project spanning more than 1m words and 1,500 images – Bambach attributes most of the picture to Leonardo’s assistant, Giovanni Antonio Boltraffio, with only “small retouchings” by the master himself.

The picture was included in the National Gallery’s 2011Leonardo exhibition, and Christie’s described it as the artistic rediscovery of the 21st century, while its whereabouts have remained a mystery since last year’s unveiling at the Abu Dhabi Louvre was cancelled.

Bambach revealed her surprise at being contacted by the National Gallery earlier this month: “I got an email request, whether I would agree to have my name released among the scholars who saw the Salvator Mundi in 2008.

“I have not wanted to answer because I do not want to be listed among people that said ‘yes’ because I wasn’t really asked what I thought about the Salvator Mundi at the time. If my name is added to that list, it will be a tacit statement that I agree with the attribution to Leonardo. I do not.”