The image of The Last Supper is as readily familiar, Kenneth Clark once wrote, as the boot shape of Italy on a map. However, the history of how this famous mural came to be painted, how precisely Leonardo painted it, and who he painted it for, are much less well-known. Ross King will describe how Leonardo received the commission (for whose execution he had little experience and even less inclination) from Lodovico Sforza, the Duke of Milan, and how he went about creating his masterpiece through an experimental new style. While the mural is burdened with many myths - most of which have no basis in fact - the true story of its execution is even more remarkable and interesting.

Ross King is the award-winning author of numerous books on Italian and French art and history, including Brunelleschi’s Dome and Michelangelo and the Pope’s Ceiling. His biography Machiavelli: Philosopher of Power has been called a “convincing portrait of one of the most misunderstood thinkers of all time.” His most recent book, published in April 2021, is The Bookseller of Florence: The Story of the Manuscripts That Illuminated the Renaissance.