The Last Supper

Description Vasari may have painted this biblical scene as well as three others (Walters 37.1705, 37.1176, 37.1704) in brown monochrome as a study for related compositions in a series of 18 larger, multicolor panels representing the correspondences between the Old and New Testaments made in 1545-1546 for the sacristy of the church of San Giovanni a Carbonara in Naples. Vasari's skill with the pen comes out in the preliminary drawings, visible in The Fall of Manna, to which he added layers of paint with his brush and fingers. These particular subjects relate to the establishment of the Holy Eucharist (Communion), when the priest at the altar symbolically re-enacts the sacrifice of Christ. The Last Supper depicts the institution of the Holy Eucharist by Christ when he offers bread and wine to his disciples, describing their symbolic significance as his body and blood, which he offers for their salvation.

Conservation

Date	Description	Narrative
4/06/1984	Examination	examined for condition

Provenance Don Marcello Massarenti Collection, Rome [date and mode of acquisition unknown] [1897 catalogue: no. 236, as Polidoro da Carabaggio]; Henry Walters, Baltimore, 1902, by purchase; Walters Art Museum, 1931, by bequest.

Credit Acquired by Henry Walters with the Massarenti Collection, 1902