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Early Editions of the Trattato

January 16 – March 2, 1984
East Building, Ground Floor, Study Center

This exhibition is no longer on view at the National Gallery.

1983-earlyeditionsoftrattato-cor

Original exhibition poster
(click to enlarge)

Overview: As the home of the only painting by Leonardo da Vinci in the Americas, the National Gallery of Art aims to be one of the primary research repositories for material related to the Renaissance master. On the occasion of a conference organized by the Gallery’s Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts focused on Leonardo da Vinci’s Last Supper, the library displayed editions of Leonardo’s treatise on painting, first published in France in 1651, after his manuscripts and notebooks had circulated for more than a century following his death. The exhibition included 19 editions published from 1716 to 1914, many of them added to the library’s holdings with the acquisitions of the Sallemi and Ladislao Reti collections of Vinciana.

Organization: The exhibition was organized by the National Gallery of Art. J. M. Edelstein, chief librarian, was curator.

Leonardo da Vinci
Italian, 1452 - 1519