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November 11, 2005
Tricky fella, Johnny Foot.
Not to be sniffed at.
The foot.
[unless you like that sort of thing]
In profile it’s okay I guess,
coming at you it’s not too bad,
but at 45 degrees it’s tricky.
But I’m not the only one to struggle. In 1975, as a keen art student, I went to London to see what some of the Old Masters had gotten up to. I was in the inner sanctum of the National Gallery, in sombre subdued orangey sodium light, casting my eye over a cartoon by your man Leonardo. The cartoon of The Virgin and St. Anne on the Rocks if I remember rightly.
It was a huge, browned, faded and tatty-edged piece of paper, or at least so it seemed in said lighting conditions. The lines were there, as drawn by Leonardo da Vinci himself – incredible. I could feel him standing there, swinging his arm as the charcoal described his imagination.
But then I saw it. In the bottom left-hand corner. St. Anne's foot. And Leonardo had scrubbed and scribbled and gotten it all wrong so many times that he just roughed out a strange cloven shape:
The end of the story was somewhat awkward. To get a closer look at the Great Man’s struggle I stepped over the little rope thingy that separates these pictures from us mere mortals. The whole thing was behind glass, so I thought no harm would come, and I could see more of Leonardo’s attempts at the forty five degree foot. But I was wrong. No sooner had my foot landed on the hallowed carpet beyond the rope than all hell broke loose. The alarms went off, lights started flashing, and guards came running.
After a breathless explanation, to some ruddy-faced custodians of the Nations Treasures, I was released. I noticed however that one of their number, having heard my story, had himself stepped over the rope and was studying the foot in question and nodding to himself. He must have been wearing special shoes as the alarms didn’t go off.
Posted by john at November 11, 2005 06:40 PM