Francis I Receiving the Last Breaths of Leonardo da Vinci

This painting by Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, executed in 1818 and held at the Petit Palais in Paris, depicts Francis I receiving the last breaths of Leonardo da Vinci, who died at the manor of Clos Lucé, near Amboise, on 2 May 1519. The king, who had drawn the elderly Florentine master to his court as early as 1516 to serve as his painter, engineer and architect, is shown supporting the head of the dying artist, in a scene marked by the intimacy and sentiment characteristic of the troubadour style then in vogue. This scene, widely popularised by Ingres, originates in Vasari's 1550 account; however, according to a royal edict of 3 May 1519, Francis I was at the time staying at Saint-Germain-en-Laye for the birth of his second son, which makes his actual presence at Leonardo's deathbed historically doubtful. Despite this uncertainty, the scene became firmly fixed in the collective memory as the very image of the enlightened patronage the king sought to embody, sealing the privileged bond between French royal power and the genius of the Italian Renaissance.