Sketches for an equestrian monument Leonardo da Vinci c.1508-10

To celebrate the 60th birthday of HRH The Prince of Wales on 14 November 2008, ten of the Royal Collection’s finest drawings by the Renaissance master Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) will be shown at the following four venues across the United Kingdom in 2008-9:

Royal Cornwall Museum, Truro

(10 May – 26 July 2008)

The Stirling Smith Art Gallery and Museum, Stirling

(8 August – 2 November 2008)

The National Library of Wales, Aberystwyth

(8 November 2008 – 7 February 2009)

Manchester Art Gallery, Manchester

(14 February – 4 May 2009).

Leonardo’s drawings are the richest, most wide-ranging, technically brilliant and endlessly fascinating of any artist, and this exhibition has been selected to demonstrate the extraordinary scope of his interests. It includes studies for painting, sculpture and architecture; a beautiful portrait of a young woman and a caricature of a grotesque old man; two exquisite studies of a dissected human skull and two of plants; a drawing of an arsenal, probably intended for a treatise on warfare; a highly accurate map of the river Arno, surveyed by Leonardo himself; a design for a dragon costume and an apocalyptic image of a deluge. The drawings demonstrate all the techniques and materials that Leonardo routinely used – metalpoint, pen and ink, brush and ink, watercolour, and red and black chalks.

The Royal Collection contains the world’s most important group of drawings by Leonardo da Vinci. These delicate works are preserved in the Royal Library at Windsor Castle and are among the greatest treasures of the Collection. Although the drawings can never be on permanent display, because of the potential for damage from exposure to light, they are regularly lent to exhibitions around the world. Ten Drawings by Leonardo da Vinci: An Exhibition to celebrate the 60th Birthday of HRH The Prince of Wales follows the success of three previous touring exhibitions of ten masterpieces from the Royal Library – held to celebrate the Millennium, The Queen’s Golden Jubilee in 2002 and Her Majesty’s 80th birthday in 2006.