“Leonardo da Vinci: Engineer and Architect,” an Exhibition at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts

Abstract

Exhibit Reviews “LEONARDO DA VINCI: ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT," AN EXHIBITION AT THE MONTREAL MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS BERT S. HALL Major exhibits often mark turning points in public consciousness. The Armory Show of 1913 marks the public acceptance of “modern art” in America, while within living memory the “Treasures of Tutankhamun ” show manifested the surprising popularity of ancient Egypt. With “Leonardo da Vinci: Engineer and Architect,” which ran from May 22 until November 8, 1987, the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (MMFA) gave public expression to a new view of the Florentine Master, emphasizing his technological oeuvre in a manner never be­ fore attempted. Major exhibits require a fine balance of forces. At the start they require money. Reports in the Canadian press credit the president of MMFA, Bernard Lamarre, with a major role in raising the estimated $3.2 million (Canadian) the show is said to have cost. Lamarre also chairs the Canadian Engineering Centennial, whose celebration the Leonardo exhibit helped commemorate, and he is as well chief ex­ ecutive officer of the giant engineering firm Lavalin. Perhaps this accounts for the list of corporate sponsors ranging like a Who’s Who of Canadian firms from Air Canada to Xerox. But money alone could never have produced something this good. Pierre Theberge, director of MMFA, engaged as curators two Leonar­ do specialists, Paolo Galluzzi of Florence and Jean Guillaume from Tours, as well as advisory assistance from Carlo Pedretti of Los An­ geles. This cast of players was a warranty of the show’s character, and over a period of nearly four years from 1983 to 1987 Theberge and his associates persuaded numerous institutions to lend their pieces of Vinciana. Prof. Hall teaches at the University of Toronto’s Institute for the History and Philosophy of Science and Technology. His review of the exhibit’s catalog appears in the Book Review section of this issue.®1988 by the Society for the History of Technology. All rights reserved. 0040-165X/88/2903-0003$01.00 606 “Leonardo da Vinci: Engineer and Architect” 607 What a collection it was! Where else could you see in one place ArundelManuscript 263, ForesterManuscripts I, II, and III, Madrid Manu­ scripts I and II, Codex Hammer (formerly MS Leicester), Paris Manuscript B, some fifteen drawings from the Royal Library at Windsor, too many manuscripts by Leonardo’s contemporaries to enumerate, as well as twenty-five working models based on Leonardo’s drawings? The show received its share of media hype. (Heck, there were even T-shirts.) Such an approach misses the point. One of the pleasant surprises about the show was just how scholarly the entire presentation was. The exhibit worked hard to reorient the viewer’s perceptions of Leonardo and his contemporaries. Entering the displays by the only available portal, we were introduced to Brunelleschi and the engi­ neering of Santa Maria del Fiore. Brunelleschi’s special hoists and positioning apparatus for ashlar are figured in the notebooks of Taccola , Buonaccorso Ghiberti, the Sangallos, and Francesco di Giorgio Martini, as well as Leonardo himself. Five models made of wood and bronze dominated the room, with didactic panels placed on the walls. The models all worked, and were demonstrated in continuously run­ ning video displays, while the panels mixed drawings by Leonardo and his contemporaries, and modern explanations. The tape-re­ corded guide to the exhibit (used by an estimated 80 percent of the viewers during my visit) stressed that Leonardo “earned his living as an engineer. . . .” By way of criticism, although this introduction radically reoriented the viewer, it may also have confused him. The cranes have the power to inspire awe, but even technically minded viewers seemed to have difficulty grasping how they worked. I watched a class of engineering students tour this gallery, and after a time I asked one student in his third year of studies if he felt he understood how the large model crane functioned (fig. 1). After fumbling awkwardly, he in turn asked me to explain it to him! There is always a question of how much comprehension one wants to try to inculcate about the mechanical details of obsolete machinery, but the alternative to comprehension seems questionable—a...