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The Hunt Is On for the Hidden Da Vinci

AOL
Posted: 2008-07-12 22:43:05
Filed Under: Science News
(July 12) - Thirty years after spotting an enticing clue, Dr. Maurizio Seracini is still trying to find a long-lost masterpiece by Leonardo da Vinci. And some of his colleagues believe he is on the verge of a remarkable discovery.

"We are talking about the masterpiece of the masterpieces of the Renaissance," Seracini told The Wall Street Journal, "way more important than The Last Supper or the Mona Lisa."

Many art historians have gone looking for "The Battle of Anghiari," a mural of war painted about 450 years ago, but rumor had it that Da Vinci had botched it and that a Medici duke had destroyed it. Then more clues began popping up, including an important one Seracini spotted when he was just a young apprentice in 1977.

In the famous Palazzo Vecchio in Florence, in a room where Da Vinci's art once donned the walls, Seracini noticed a small cryptic phrase on a painting by Giorgio Vasari. On one tiny green flag, Vasari had written "cera trova," meaning "seek and you will find."

To Seracini, that meant one thing: Da Vinci's prized work lay behind Vasari's art. The problem was, in order to search for the lost masterpiece, the Seracini would have to knock down the walls covered with Renaissance art.

Fast forward to 2008. Seracini, now a professor at the University of California, San Diego, and a pioneer in forensic art analysis, is working with noninvasive imaging techniques to look through the walls in that same room to find the "The Battle of Anghiari."

Inch by inch, his team of researchers is using new technology to scan the walls of the Palazzo Vecchio where he is convinced Da Vinci's masterpiece has stood untouched for more than four centuries.

Next year the search is set to reach a climax. Seracini plans to use a portable neutron-beam scanner that is still in development to peer through the walls and into history.

"If we succeed, we will not only have a way to find the Leonardo," Dr. Seracini says, "but we will have a technology that could detect murals world-wide."

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2008-07-12 22:43:05
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Recent Comments

1 - 10 of 679
679 comments

xujulie 08:39:38 PM Jul 14 2008

how sad. the specimen who declared art a waste of time also had the spelling, grammar, and mechanics skills of a second grader. typical, though.

jeff1214 06:51:40 PM Jul 14 2008

When I paint I always hide Waldo somewhere.

jeff1214 06:50:57 PM Jul 14 2008

Maybe there is something else hidden in the picture. Is there anyway to get a large copy of this fresco?

celienet 01:07:17 PM Jul 14 2008

Yippee!

jffrysmit 10:05:52 AM Jul 14 2008

allen18785 -- art is retarded and a waist of time. i personally dont care what someone painted hundreds of years ago. Just because someones painting survived all these years they are called "Genus" by default. For every Duh Vinci there are a hundred others who never got noticed. Boring. im gonna go play playstation now-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------All is not lost allen. Maybe when you get through puberty and out of your teens you will learn to appreciate art a little more. We were all your age once and know what it is like to think you know it all. Good luck. We're all pulling for you!

allen18785 09:02:57 AM Jul 14 2008

art is retarded and a waist of time. i personally dont care what someone painted hundreds of years ago. Just because someones painting survived all these years they are called "Genus" by default. For every Duh Vinci there are a hundred others who never got noticed. Boring. im gonna go play playstation now

beefarm51 02:08:16 AM Jul 14 2008

his name is Leonardo, not 'of Vinci'. get with it you all!

tannervin 11:40:17 PM Jul 13 2008

In the famous Palazzo Vecchio in Florence, in a room where Da Vinci's art once donned the walls, ===You know, it's a sorry state of affairs when professional writers misuse the English language. "donned" means to put on, to wear. The word should be "ADORNED." Geez.

doranoswego 11:06:11 PM Jul 13 2008

How fascinating..Yawn! The lurid details of Da Vinci's sex life are far more interesting.I once painted over a Rembrandt sketch.It was a lovely Mexican mural with an Aztec calender and some giant ears of corn.I used a brush and roller.

gbelter777 10:38:54 PM Jul 13 2008

i paint something myself.....Lenny was a good painter too.greg belter

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