St John the Baptist1513-16Oil on panel,
69 x 57 cm
Musée du Louvre, Paris
St John the Baptist is looking at the observer impressively and declaring his identity by means of gestures and gazes.
The picture is probably one of the three works which Antonio de Beads saw in Leonardo's studio in Clos-Lucé in 1517.
It is the last painting to be produced by Leonardo himself, and was probably already completed in Rome.
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Regarding the John Gesture,
Note the exaggerated length of the index finger (Only recently determined to be a female characteristic). In that Da Vinci was an ardent student of anatomy, and obviously keenly interested in the differences between men and women (both physical and psychological), is it possible that the unnaturally long index finger (the John Gesture) is simply pointing us at what Davinci thinks about John’s sexuality. If there ever was anyone capable of painting an anatomically correct person, it was Davinci. But he makes the index finger exaggeratedly long. Obviously in those days he could not come right out and say that John was mentally effeminate, but he knew that one day the world would catch on to this subtle physical difference between men and women. Was this his “secret code”? Is this one step toward explaining the “sacred feminine” that Davinci seemed to be obsessed with?
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