When he painted the Mona Lisa and The Last Supper, Leonardo da Vinci also ended up conducting chemical experiments. The Renaissance painter created a rare compound called plumbonacrite to use as a base for painting.
Many paintings since the 16th century, including the Mona Lisa, were painted on wooden panels, so artists had to cover them with a thick layer, usually plaster, which would serve as a base for the oil painting. Leonardo created his own substance.
According to a study by the American Chemical Society, Leonardo da Vinci used a whitewash (lead white) compound as a base for the Mona Lisa and The Last Supper and mixed lead monoxide, a highly toxic compound, into his oil paintings. , which imparted drying properties to the paint. The mixture of two components ended up creating plumbonacrite (Pb5(CO3)O(OH)2).
Many painters use lead oxides to help paint dry, but it was not a known technique in Da Vinci’s time.
Researchers also examined Leonardo’s manuscripts for clues indicating the deliberate use of this technique, but found only references to chemical compounds associated with medicine.
The presence of plumbonacrite in the two best-known Renaissance paintings was revealed by the analysis of samples of the two paintings carried out by a team of experts from the French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS), with the help of the European supermicroscope ESRF.
Source: TSF
