uring early January 2012, I travelled to Italy and saw Leonardo da Vinci’s fabulous mural, The Last Supper. This was a rare opportunity to look at a Renaissance masterpiece that has been referred in a lot of writings – from the academic analysis of EH Gombrich to popular fiction by Dan Brown. I speculated that the long queue of Japanese tourists at the refectory of Santa Maria della Grazie, Milan, was not the result of extensive reading of the British art historian, but of pulp fiction produced by the American author.

After a while it was my turn to enter and observe the figures of Jesus Christ (peace be upon him), the twelve apostles including the dark faced Judas Iscariot and the remarkable illusion of extended space behind the group on the food table. The picture is a marvel of perspective, an accomplished portrayal of human postures and a splendid achievement in terms of creating a sense of physical presence on a two-dimensional surface. Since it was actually on a wall above the room where monks used to have their meals twice a day it allowed them the privilege of spiritually accompanying the Christ (peace be upon him) and his disciples.

While admiring the picture, I spotted a number of loaves of bread on the table linen. The bread, a small ordinary, brownish article, which has no significance otherwise (except as a metaphor for the body of the Christ (peace be upon him) for the follower of Christianity), contributed to making the visual credible. Many visitors of the convent may not notice it or recall it later – since it does not play any role in the Saviour’s last moments or Brown’s mystery-thriller. For a painter, however, that loaf of bread was as real, as fresh, as warm, as placed on the table two thousand years ago – or in the Italian painter’s workplace - around 1495-98.

One wonders why these loaves were so tangible, crisp and living, compared even to Christ (peace be upon him) and his apostles. One believes the personages exited but one is also aware that their representation in the mural is not their true likeness. The Italian master had never seen the man who had lived in Galilee. The painter must have studied texts on Christ’s physique and attire and relying on models available in his studio, created a picture – correct to the best of his knowledge. It was still a mere assumption. This is also true of the twelve companions. But when it comes to the loaf of bread, Da Vinci did not have to consult textual accounts to portray it. Bread was still being produced in the Mediterranean region. He might have picked a portion of his breakfast to include in the work commissioned by his patron, Ludovico Sfroza, the duke of Milan.

A viewer, eager and fortunate enough to set his/ her eyes on Da Vinci’s The Last Supper may end up admiring the representation of a bread more than the grand narrative rendered by the master because the undeniable physicality of that tiny article cannot be ignored, avoided or forgotten. The loaf of bread placed (painted) by Da Vinci on the white fabric will tempt a Twenty-First Century visitor to touch, pick and feel its weight, texture and warmth. For centuries, it has remained crusty and fresh (as if just out of a baker’s oven).

In a sense, the British painter known for his large-scale studio-constructed landscapes was not making art. He was instead studying and collecting data through these small surfaces. However, their unexpected, unrestrained and enjoyed nature made them distinct, striking and appealing.

It is apparent that the intention of the artist was to recreate a plausible version of the episode from the New Testament. The loaves of bread and the cotton tablecloth were mere props. But (not?) surprisingly, in relation to Jesus (peace be upon him), the apostles and the illusion of a receding background, the presence of an ordinary wheat bread could be more relatable by a lay person, not informed on the details of Christ’s life, to recognise an item consumed at home. For Leonardo the believer, all thirteen people were as significant as mentioned in the religious text. For Da Vinci, the painter, banal stuff also required great attention. In representing the remote figures from the Middle East, some fabrication, amendment or omission was permissible; but when it came to something as mundane, familiar and ordinary as a loaf of bread, one could not invent or modify it.

Not subscribing to the chain of meanings attached to a loaf of bread at Christian ceremonies, the depiction of this delicate and delicious article could be about something else: about the difference in the position/ interpretation of a maker and viewer; about the mainstream and the periphery; about the patron and the painter. For people from the painter’s surroundings the entire story/ scene imagined by Da Vinci was so convincing that the scattered pieces of bread may not have registered. Bread is not the key to unearthing the depth of this masterpiece, or to venturing on the trail of a Twentieth Century novel.

Yet Da Vinci painted this object meticulously and as potently as the table cloth. The two objects, not crucial in the central narrative, gave him freedom from the main subject. Hence his brush was at its best when delineating those.

The phenomenon is observable elsewhere too. Not infrequently, the intention fades and what shines is a minor exercise, like the informal, quick outdoor sketches painted by John Constable that are now considered a substantial contribution towards a new art movement: impressionism.

In a sense, the British painter known for his large-scale studio-constructed landscapes was not making art; he was instead studying and collecting data through these small surfaces. However, their unexpected, unrestrained and enjoyed nature made them distinct, striking and appealing, much like the practice of a painter who draws a human body and its background, but while doing so depicts a door latch in such a manner that it ends up being an extraordinary and powerful image on its own.

Perhaps the soul of art carves its passage/ place amid the burden of theological, historical and philosophical narratives; like a new shoot sprouting out of dull, damp and dense earth.

The writer is an art critic, a curator and a professor at the School of Visual Arts and Design, Beaconhouse National University, Lahore