(gentle music) - [Dr. Zucker] We're in Santa
Maria delle Grazie in Milan, looking at Leonardo da
Vinci's "Last Supper." - [Dr. Harris] And we're in the room where the monks would eat the refractory. And so several times a day, the monks would come in
here and eat silently and be able to look up at
Leonardo's "Last Supper". - [Dr. Zucker] It's an
ideal place, of course, for this particular subject
and not an uncommon one. - [Dr. Harris] So let's
talk about the story. At the "Last Supper," Christ says, "One of you will betray
me to his 12 apostles." - [Dr. Zucker] And one of the ways that this painting is often read, is not the moment when Christ utters that, but the moment after when
the reaction takes place. These are his closest followers. - [Dr. Harris] And so we see the shock at hearing these terrible
words from Christ. "Is it I," they ask, "Is it
I Lord, who will betray you?" - [Dr. Zucker] And so what we see, is this incredible set of reactions from the apostles around the table. - [Dr. Harris] So that's one way we can understand the fresco. But there's another
aspect of the narrative. - [Dr. Zucker] Christ you can see, is reaching towards both a
glass of wine and towards bread. And this is the institution
of the sacrament. - [Dr. Harris] The
sacrament of the Eucharist, where Christ says, "Take this
bread for this is my body. "Take this wine for this is
my blood, and remember me." And you can see that he reaches out toward the bread and the wine. - [Dr. Zucker] But what's
interesting is that Christ's hand is widely spread, so it seems as if he's
reaching towards the wine, but at the same time, he's
reaching toward a bowl. And at the same moment Judas is reaching towards that same bowl. - [Dr. Harris] Judas is the one who's going to betray Christ. He's been paid 30 pieces
of silver by the Romans, and you can see he's
grasped that bag of silver in his right hand as he
pulls away from Christ, his face cast in shadow. - [Dr. Zucker] But he's
pulling away at the same time that he's still reaching out to the bowl, and that's one of the ways that Christ identifies
who will betray him, the person who shares, who
dips with him in that bowl. - [Dr. Harris] So Leonardo tells us several moments in this story. And at the same time gives us a sense of the divine eternal
importance of this story. I mean, we would never mistake this for 13 people having dinner, we know that this is an important moment. Without any of the obvious
symbols of the divine that we would have in the early
Renaissance like the halo. - [Dr. Zucker] The figures themselves are monumental in this space, and too crowded for that table, creating a kind of energy, a kind of chaos that surrounds the
perfection, the solemnity, the geometry of Christ. - [Dr. Harris] Christ forms,
an equilateral triangle. His head is in the center of a circle. The window that frames
his head reads as a halo, there's that calm center. And then human beings
with all of their faults, and fears, and worries
around that divine center. - [Dr. Zucker] This is Leonardo da Vinci, who is thinking about mathematics, he's thinking about science. He's thinking about the
integration of all of these things. - [Dr. Harris] If we
look at earlier images of the "Last Supper" there's
lots of room at the table, there's lots of decorations in the room. What Leonardo does is
he simplifies everything and focuses us on those
figures and their gestures. And by making it so that there's
no room behind the table, the figures take up so much space. It's separating our world from the world of Christ and the apostles, there's no way for us to enter that space. - [Dr. Zucker] In fact,
there's no way for them to move into our space, there
really is this demarcation. - [Dr. Harris] In
versions of "Last Supper" that Leonardo would've seen in Florence, Judas is sitting on the
opposite side of the table. And by putting Judas
with the other apostles, he does use the table as a barrier between our world and the
world of the apostles. - [Dr. Zucker] Let's look at
those faces for just a moment. Christ is so serene, his eyes are down. One hand is up, one hand is down. To his right is a group of three. And there is Judas who's
facing away from us in shadow. His neck is turned reminding us that, that night he will hang himself. Now, as he pulls away, St. Peter, Christ protector, rushes in. He's got a knife that
he holds around his back and he comes in seeming to say almost, "Who is it, I need to defend you?" - [Dr. Harris] The third
figure in that group with Judas and Peter would be St. John who looks very resigned
and closes his eyes. And that's the tradition and
paintings of the "Last Supper." My favorite three figures are
the figures on the far right. Leonardo was very interested in using the body to reveal the soul, to reveal one's internal nature. But Leonardo was creating
these four groups of three, that idea of kniting the figures together, overlapping them with one
another, creating all this drama. - [Dr. Zucker] And creating
tensions and contrast between the emotional
responses of all these figures is that incredible grouping
of Thomas pointing upward. - [Dr. Harris] As if to say, is this something that is ordained by God? Is this God's plan that
one of us should betrayed? - [Dr. Zucker] But of course, that finger also foreshadows him, actually proving Christ's resurrection by plunging that finger
into Christ's wound. And then we have Philip
and James the Major, and they're in opposition one
throwing his arms out one, bringing his hands together. - [Dr. Harris] And if
we were to compare this with earlier "Last Suppers", we would see the way that the figures remained very
separate from one another. And hear that idea of
the unified composition, which is so characteristic
of the High Renaissance. But what I sense here more than anything is the divinity of Christ
here in the center. His calm, the way that all
of those perspective lines bring us toward him. - [Dr. Zucker] It's interesting because that perspective
that the artist is rendering is slightly at odds with the perspective as we see it from down here on the floor, that is we would need to
be close to Christ level, to see this painting in a perspective, highly correct manner. And it's interesting, in
a sense it elevates us as we look at this painting. - [Dr. Harris] Now, keep in
mind, we're not seeing this the way that people
would've seen it in 1498. - [Dr. Zucker] The painting
is in terrible condition in part because Leonardo experimented with a combination of
oil paint and tempera in an environment where fresco
would be traditionally used, and the painting began to deteriorate soon after it was completed. - [Dr. Harris] Right,
unlike a traditional fresco, which is painted on wet plaster, Leonardo painted on dry plaster and the paint never really
adhered to the wall. So luckily for us, the "Last
Supper" has been conserved. - [Dr. Zucker] And so in some ways, this is finding a way of
creating a sense of the eternal, a sense of the perfect,
but within the chaos that is the human experience. - [Dr. Harris] That's right, uniting the earthly and the divine. (gentle music)