HISTORY AND THEORY OF ATTRIBUTION

(31.5.2023) There is no history of deattribution. Which means: of course there is a history of error, ideology, illusion, individual mistake, institutional failure, social disinterest, and so on – but no one, up to the present day, has ever attempted to write a history of deattribution (although there are very prominent examples, such as the Man with the Golden Helmet; or the Toccata and Fugue in D-minor, and, if one does like so: the works of Shakespeare). Deattribution (in German: Abschreibung) means that the assumed authorship of a work of art (which can also be a piece of music, perhaps even a corpus of literature) has to be revised, after individuals, institutions (scholarly disciplines), or even whole societies have realized that the assumed author of a work of art cannot be the actual author. But this is theory. In reality it does not happen that way: the ways of dealing with error, disillusion, and so on, are manyfolded. Yes, individuals realize, discliplines (or parts of them) revise, and perhaps some individuals in society do take notice (after the media have made a fuss about a deattribution), but the actual question is: do societies, do institutions investigate the reasons for failure, to secure – by establishing methodological standards, best practices – that failure does not happen again? Perhaps, in some cases. In the case of art history, subdisciplinary fields, and, alas, the institution of art history as a whole, do not seem to have the slightest interest to establish any standards. On the contrary: one does not even have a memory for failure. And this might be a reason, a minor reason, why a history of deattribution might be necessary. Or at least: a reflection on the problem of deattribution.

1) Individual Mistake and Institutional Failure

In my last contribution on the Salvator Mundi attribution (reproduced below) I have made clear that I think that the Salvator Mundi authentication did fail. I do think as well that individual scholars have an individual responsibility for that (in the frame of institutional failure), but the failure of the institution of art history as a whole is more grave. I have tried to make clear on many occasions that I do not wish, if possible, to blame individuals for individual mistake. This is my ethical standpoint. But I do blame institutional failure, which is more grave, because this is about a discipline that is not able to correct individual error. And more than that: this is about a complete lack of intellectual standards, methods, rules and practices that should be the basis to handle questions of attribution; it is about an almost complete disinterest for the field of connoisseurship, which one does practice occasionally (and amateurishly), but has outsourced rather to whatever place (where it might also be handled amateurishly).
It is not only about the fact that the Salvator Mundi problem has been produced by scholars, by the discipline, that is; it is also about the fact that, after twelve years, the problem has not been solved, and the discipline has not even begun to think about the reasons for this lack of progress.
You may say: well, this is only about Leonardo studies, only about the Leonardo world, the Leonardo circus, which is a Disneyland anyway. And my answer to that is: not quite; but yes, the Leonardo world is in fact a Disneyland, a place any scholar with a serious ambition has to leave (in disgust), and Leonardo studies do not really exist as an institution (in fact only rudimentary institutional structures do exist; the name of Leonardo studies is simply an umbrella for anything, given that individuals have managed to be seen as Leonardo scholars; society at large has, in truth, very little interest in Leonardo, apart from worshipping an abstract ideal of genius). The problem is: if Leonardo studies do show incapable to deal with attribution and deattribution, the larger disciplinary field of art history should correct the field of Leonardo studies. But such structures do not exist. And there is neither a history of attribution or deattribution. There is a lack of memory, as well as a lack of methodological idealism. And still: deattributions do happen. In some way.

2) The Case of Rembrandt

It is interesting, in 2023, to read (or to re-read) Svetlana Alpers’ 1988 study on Rembrandt, on Rembrandt as an entrepreneur, and on the Rembrandt workshop (see reference below). Because this exceptional scholar was writing under the impression that the Man with the Golden Helmet, one of the most iconic ›Rembrandts‹, had just been deattributed. And what kind of deattribution was that? Did it happen according to some sociological textbook? Did someone establish, successfully, a new orthodoxy? Did society care? Did the disciplinary field of Rembrandt studies learn from that, or even the discipline of art history as a whole? An adequate answer might be given in a history of deattribution. My impression is that, yes, in some way, this deattribution was partly successful, although I also do think that many, many people do not believe in it, and that there is actually no consensus at all about methodology or anything else in Rembrandt studies. And part of my answer is also: the deattribution of the Man with the Golden Helmet has much to do with the history of the Rembrandt Research Project (the deattribution was backed by Ernst van de Wetering; but a German scholar did take the responsibility of establishing it, by publishing a German brochure which unfolded the reasons). And part of my answer is also, that I do believe that the outcome of the so-called Rembrandt Research Project, which started ambitiously, as far as methods were concerned, was very ambiguous as well, because methodology was changed, while the project was conducted; and after the project was carried out, methodology was probably even more controversial (and chaotic) than before.
Perhaps there was misery and glory, but if the mess, as to best practices, metholodical standards, is bigger than it was before, one can hardly speak of a success. And therefore I prefer to speak of ambiguity. Do people actually know the reasons for which the Man with the Golden Helmet has been deattributed? I don’t think so (and I have done an online documentation dedicated to these reasons, on this website). Is it a deattribution that will stand the test of time? I don’t know, and I am also not considering myself to be a Rembrandt scholar, but the methodological questions actually do concern or should concern any scholar in the field of art history, and in the humanities. But the truth is that there is rather disinterest than interest, on the whole.
In my view, the problem of the Rembrandt Research Project was not only that it did start in naiveté, as far as methodology was concerned; the problem was, more specifically, that it did not start as a ›Rembrandt and the Rembrandt circle‹ project. In other words: does it make sense to discuss authorship in the field of Rembrandt, if not the same amount of energy is dedicated to pupils and followers, as is dedicated to the master? And this brings us back to the case of Leonardo studies, where the same type of almost systematic bias can be studied, and, in the context of a reflection on deattribution, has to be studied.

3) Rembrandt as an Entrepreneur – Leonardo as an Entrepreneur

It is funny, in some way, that there are many examples of great masters that, in past decades, have been studied by art historians as entrepreneurs. Even Michelangelo can be studied as an entrepreneur, and if Michelangelo, why not Leonardo? ›Entrepreneur‹ means that these masters had – also – an existence as entrepreneurs, which means: as the head of a workshop, which can, and has also to be seen as an economic entity, briefly: as business. These workshops had to be managed, and these workshops had to function according to economic principles. ›Entrepreneur‹ does not mean that a great master was necessarily interested in economic success, in money. Was Leonardo interested in money? I don’t think so. I think that he was interested to have as much time to do the studies he was interested in. And his workshop did assist him also for that matter. Leonardo did outsource things, if one may say so. And it is perhaps a tragic irony that the notoriously famous Salvator Mundi painting may be a picture that even Leonardo wanted to look like a Leonardo, even if he did not paint it, but only contributed a blessing hand to it (which is the degree of contribution I do think is likely). If it now turns out that the attribution to Leonardo (in the sense of a wholly autograph painting) does not stand – does the discipline of art history, does the subdiscipline of Leonardo studies have the necessary tools, the categories – to categorize such painting? Perhaps, in the future. But it is necessary to refine the tools, to reestablish standards, to have a memory, And perhaps a history of deattribution would be of help, apart from that the problems it would deal with are very general human problems, which are necessary to keep in mind regarding any field of human practice.

Selected Literature:
Svetlana Alpers, Rembrandt als Unternehmer. Sein Atelier und der Markt, Cologne 1989 [1988]

On Where and Why the Salvator Mundi Authentication Did Fail

(29.5.2023) Roughly two years after it has become obvious (to informed people in the Leonardo field) that the Salvator Mundi authentication was never based on adequate scholarship (to put it mildly), I find it necessary to sum up where and why this authentication went wrong and did fail. Did it fail?, you might ask, adding: but half of the world still seems to believe in it. To this my answer is: yes, but to maintain the claim that we see an wholly autograph picture done by Leonardo da Vinci, you would have to start from scratch. Because this attribution is virtually falsified. Which means that you can still try to maintain it, but you would have to do this, despite of having to admit that the research was not adequate (to put it mildly), and you would have to do this against (what I believe to be is) better knowledge. And why do we not hear more on this situation in the field, as it presents itself to an informed scholar? Because what the world (journalists, curators, average people and so on) does not know, is that whoever was responsible for that attribution was lacking an adequate awareness for the problems of attribution, and thus was not able to handle this question of attribution adequately (and this includes all the Leonardo ›authorities‹ in the field, the people that journalists without adequate knowledge turn to, to have explained to them what the situation in the field is). And this state is still the current state in the field. And this is why it seems, and why it in fact is necessary to sum up where and why the authentication did fail.

1) On Where the Authentication Did Fail

The key passage is on page 49 in Dalivalle / Kemp / Simon 2019 (see reference below). This does not mean that the authentication did fail on this page. It does mean that it is enough to quote from page 49 to understand why the authentication process did go wrong. The passage reads:

»All the other versions of the composition, now numbering over twenty, as well as Hollar’s etching, consistently portrayed the thumb bent to the left. We tried and failed to come up with an explanation other than the most obvious one: that this first placement of the thumb was a pentimento, an initial idea for the orientation of the thumb, one never fully completed, but carried out in pink underpaint and later obscured by the background once the final position of the thumb had been determined.«

›We tried and failed to come up with an explanation other than the most obvious one‹. My commentary to this is: it is very easy to come up with an alternative explanation for the pentimento in version Cook, but it certainly (as I am assuming) was not wanted. Because it is an explanation that undermines the claim that we see, with version Cook, the prototype for all other versions. And my alternative explanation I have developed, roughly two years ago (in my book, chapter 9, and also in chapter 28, see links below) after noting that a Blessing Christ in the Hermitage, which is dated 1495, does show an upright thumb, and not one bent to the left. The question is: was this a version earlier than version Cook? Which would mean that the pentimento in version Cook might be only a shift from one pattern to the other, with both patterns having existed before version Cook. And the question is: are you able to rule that mere possibility out? And the answer is: for almost two years now we have heard nothing on that matter. The whole Leonardo field, in fact, would have to concede that the field did not know that picture in the Hermitage. And either you can include this picture in your narrative, or everything that has been claimed in the past 12 years is obsolete. (And in addition to that one has to say that there is also no adequate Leonardo da Vinci oeuvre catalogue, currently, a professional catalogue that would include versions, copies, follower’s works, and so on, a catalogue that would, among other things, serve the purpose, that one would not be surprised to find such pictures as the Hermitage Blessing Christ, a picture that the Hermitage did not put on actual display, but neither did the Hermitage, one of the most important museums in the world, hide it away).

Now we come to the question of where exactly the authentication did go wrong: it went wrong because there was no one, among the experts consulted, who was able to question the idea that version Cook, because of the pentimento, might have been a prototype. Which means: on every occasion it was still possible, based on critical thinking, to question the interpretation of the pentimento as the one main reason to think of an autograph picture, this did not happen. Because there was no one who thought of this possibility, for whatever reason (with the main reason being, as I am assuming, that there was no one with an adequate understanding of attributional problems, with an awareness also, of the risks in handling attributional questions). The answer to ›where‹ is thus: whereever there was the possibility to still apply critical thinking and to come up with ›an explanation other‹, which means: an alternative interpretation of the pentimento (such as the one I have suggested two years ago).

What happened was probably that, in the frame of a coalition of interests, individuals did confirm each other in the belief to see an autograph picture. No one did question the interpretation of the pentimento (also Martin Kemp does confirm it, in Dalivalle / Kemp / Simon, on p. 97, instead of questioning it). With the result that the individuals responsible did not even pubblish a scholarly explanation that would be an adequate base for the attribution. Because what we have is a diverse salad made of one apparently scholarly book, published in 2019 (see below), which, yet, does not seek to explain the attribution, but rather seems to take it for granted (which is the opposite of: questioning); further: a website by the restorer, a press release, an exhibition catalogue (National Gallery, London), a sales catalogue (for the 2017 auction), and so on. This diverse mix does represent the aforementioned coalition of interests, in which critical thinking was underrepresented. Which explains the mess we have today, with no one wanting to react to most substantial doubts, leading to the question that the initial pentimento interpretation might have been wrong.

(At this point I am referring again to my book, chapter 9 and 28, which means, to informations, to an argument available now for almost two years)

2) On Why the Authentication Did Fail

The authentication, based on a couple of other arguments (beyond the pentimento argument), did fail, because all these ›couple of arguments‹ are falsified or virtually falsified (with almost no one, obviously, taking notice that they are). These arguments include the claim that Hollar, in his now famous etching, does, allegedly, represent version Cook. This argument I consider to be falsified (see annex 1 to my book, with link below; as well as my essay on the Fontainebleau Group; see as well link below). But it is in fact the whole narrative that was built on the interpretation of the pentimento, a narrative represented by Martin Kemp, and being represented in Dalivalle / Kemp / Simon 2019, it is the whole narrative that is virtually falsified, and this despite all the erudition displayed in this book, because this erudition works only in the service of this one narrative which was never seriously questioned. Which would be the purpose of scholarship: to question things, to test hypotheses (as well as alternative hypotheses), and not to rule serious alternatives out right from the beginning (which leads only to the establishing of ideologies). But the book only seeks to manifest and to develop this one direction, and the tragic of this book is, that there is most serious reason to believe that there are other directions, of which the authors have taken no notice at all, and do not want to take notice, because it would mean to concede that the whole construction, the whole narrative the book is based on, and which it does further unfold, might be wrong.

The provenance narrative that is developed in this book might be useful in its own right, but there is serious reason to believe that it is not the provenance of version Cook (for all this see my two contributions on the Fontainebleau group, with links below). Which, all in all, makes me say, that the authentication process went wrong, and it did fail, because to maintain the claim that we see a wholly autograph picture by Leonardo, a picture that was represented by Hollar in an etching, and a picture that was in the possession of Henriette Maria, Queen of England (and taken to the court of Charles I), to maintain that claim you would have to rule every serious doubt out. And this did never happen, not before 2011, not after 2011, and not after I did publish my findings. Findings that people with no adequate understanding for questions of attribution might think not to be important. But it is wrong to think that these findings are not important. And scholarship is based on the distinction of right and wrong; it is not meant to produce ideologies, but to question things seriously, especially if there are reasons for very serious doubts. And here, in this case, there are plenty of such reasons.

One last word on the mantra that this picture, version Cook, does have a ›presence‹, and that Leonardos do have a ›presence‹. On this subjective feel attributions cannot be based on, and certainly not Leonardo attributions, because in countless cases in the past, people have thought that a picture had a ›presence‹, and that Leonardos do have a ›presence‹ (implying that only Leonardos do have this ›presence‹). Bernard Berenson, among these people, did once think that. And all these people, including Bernard Berenson, turned out to be wrong. Serious scholarship does ask, if also a picture by Francesco Melzi, if shown in appropriate light, might have a ›presence‹. This would mean to think in alternative hypotheses, and this is what the essence of scholarship is: not to produce ideologies and not allow ideologies to be produced.

Selected Literature:
Margaret Dalivalle / Martin Kemp / Robert B. Simon, Leonardo’s Salvator Mundi & the Collecting of Leonardo in the Stuart Courts, Oxford 2019

Some Salvator Mundi Resources

Here is an overview concerning my contributions to Salvator Mundi studies and research (since 2016). In 2021 I did publish my book A New Salvator Mundi History on this website (see the 32 chapters with the two annexes below). The essays and notes I did write earlier, as well as the essays and notes published since then, appear seperately, under the header ›Early Essays and Notes‹, respectively ›Recent Essays and Notes‹.

Early Essays and Notes


A Salvator Mundi Provenance (2016; additions in 2017 and later)

Leonardeschi Gold Rush

Some Salvator Mundi Microstories (2018)

Some Salvator Mundi Afterthoughts (2019)

Some Salvator Mundi Variations

Some Salvator Mundi Revisions (2019)

A Salvator Mundi Geography (2019/20)

A Salvator Mundi Atlas (2020)

The Bias of Superficiality

A Salvator Mundi Questionnaire

A New Salvator Mundi History


A Salvator Mundi Puzzle (chapter 1)

Unknown Melzi (chapter 2)

Francis I and the Crown of Charlemagne (chapter 3)

From Amboise to Fontainebleau (chapter 4)

Drones Above Chambord (chapter 5)

Looking Back at Conques (chapter 6)

Flaubert At Fontainebleau (chapter 7)

Images of Imperial Ideology (chapter 8)

The Chronicles of Santa Maria delle Grazie (chapter 9)

SeeingRightThroughSomeone (chapter 10)

Melzi the Secretary (chapter 11)

Eying Glass (chapter 12)

A Foil to the Mona Lisa (chapter 13)

A Renaissance of the Cartoon (chapter 14)

Sketching a Family Tree (chapter 15)

Venetian Variations (chapter 16)

A Brief History of Digital Restoring (chapter 17)

A Consortium of Painters (chapter 18)

Leonardeschi and Landscape (chapter 19)

A Christ In Profile (chapter 20)

Learning to See in Spanish Milan (chapter 21)

A History of Gestures (chapter 22)

Leonardo and Josquin (chapter 23)

A Renaissance of the Hybrid (chapter 24)

Suida and Heydenreich (chapter 25)

The Watershed (chapter 26)

Three Veils (chapter 27)

From BeginningToEnd (chapter 28)

Connoisseurship of AI (chapter 29)

Twilight and Enlightenment (chapter 30)

A SalvatorMundiGeography (annex 1)

A SalvatorMundiAtlas (annex 2)

Recent Essays and Notes


The Salvator Mundi in Bruegel and Rubens

Some Salvator Mundi Documentaries

Some More Salvator Mundi Monkey Business

The Windsor Sleeve

Art Historians and Historians

Five Fallacies in Attribution

A Salvator Mundi Chronicle

Salvator Mundi Scholarship in 2016

The Salvator Mundi and the French Revolution

Treasure Hunt

The Fontainebleau Group

Leonardo da Vinci at the Courts

The Fontainebleau Group Continued

The Windsor Sleeve Continued

The Salvator Mundi in Early Netherlandish Painting 1

A New Salvator Mundi Questionnaire

The Last Bruegel

The Yarborough Group

The Yarborough Group Continued

A Salvator Mundi Global History

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