The Louvre cleans a Leonardo

October 15 2011

Exciting news - the Louvre has released some images of its restoration of Leonardo's Virgin and Child with St Anne. You can zoom in on what it used to look like here. 

The Louvre is famously averse to cleaning pictures. Some (including me) would say that the Louvre's keep-em-dirty approach has paid off, for wandering around the collection today it is noticeable that the pictures are generally in exceptional condition. Ov average, the collection is in better condition than that of the National Gallery, which was one of the first public galleries to start cleaning pictures, often with disastrous consequences. These days, happily, cleaning techniques are advanced enough for us to be sure of doing as little permanent damage as possible.

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