On the occasion of the five hundredth anniversary of the death of Leonardo da Vinci and on the occasion of the Gay Pride parade of Tuscany, which will take place in Pisa on 6 July, the “Ippolito Rosellini” cultural group, with the Patronage of the Municipality of Vicopisano and the ‘Pink riot Arci gay’ association, has organized an exhibition with the theme “Eros at the time of Leonardo da Vinci”.

The exhibition, curated by Giovanni Ranieri Fascetti, presents, through images and texts, from the 1400s and 1500s, homosexual and heterosexual love during the time of the great genius. Leonardo, along with many artists and writers of his era, contributed decisively to a veritable revolution in thoughts and customs: by bringing men’s attention back to nature and the beauty of our human bodies.

Re-reading Kenneth Clark’s seminal work ‘The Nude’ I realise that a heavy blow was dealt to the predominance of medieval sexophobia and to that sense of sin (just look at Charles Kingsley’s novel – of ‘Water Babies’ fame – ‘Hypatia’ in this respect) which for centuries had oppressed western humanity and was used by the ruling classes to consolidate their wealth and power.

This revolution led to a rediscovery of classical myths and a properly primordial conception of life: it was a weapon for the destruction of homophobic and sexophobic fanaticism against beauty; that beauty pervading works of true genius. Without it such masterpieces as Botticelli’s ‘Birth of Venus’ could never have been conceived.

The location of the exhibition, Vicopisano’s Palazzo Pretorio, is not accidental: in 1503 Leonardo da Vinci was in Vicopisano engaged in the development of projects for the conquest of Pisa. That ambience, hosting the exhibition with its ancient secrets, serves, with its atmosphere of a dark and repressive place, to give an idea of ​​how terrible punishments could be for ‘sexual faults’.

My parents were divided in this celebration of emancipation of love independence of gender. My father still thought of that category of ‘queers’. My mother, as a psychoanalyst, had a soft spot for what Oscar Wilde described as ‘the love that cannot be told’, although, paradoxically, she couldn’t stand lesbians, or even women wearing trousers.

Times have changed, fortunately, in many parts of the world. I am not afraid to admit my encounters in my teens with same-sex relations. I see them as fun, not serious, and as a positive development in my final decision to go for heterosexuality in the love for my partner.

Yet, to this day (recently, most notoriously in Brunei), there are many parts of the world where marriage (let alone love) is still regarded as only heterosexual, to be punished otherwise by the secession of life in the loving partners.

Those days when a woman would lie flat on a bed and ‘think of England’ while her male partner penetrated her, in the hope that she would produce an heir worthy of the nation, have long long since passed.

May we hope that such times disappear and that love may be re-established throughout the world, regardless of sex, gender, or whatever other fashionable nomenclature may be applied to it, as the sole redeeming and truly godly essence that will save our beautiful and so sadly threatened world.

In this respect I note that Bagni di Lucca, under its former and admirable mayor Massimo Betti, celebrated its first gay marriage, of which I was the officiant, at Pian di Fiume, over eight years ago and that, since the legge Cirinna’ of 2017, same-sex civil marriages have become sanctioned under Italian law. Indeed, we attended such a marriage in the same fortress of Vicopisano where the Eros exhibition takes place, this year. For more details on that see my post at https://longoio3.com/2019/04/20/civil-union-at-vicopisano/

May LOVE ever be told. FOR EVER NOW.

“Eros during the time of Leonardo da Vinci” will be inaugurated at 9pm on Friday 5 July and will remain open to the public until 30 July every Saturday, from 3.30pm to 6pm and Sunday from 10am to 12.30pm and from 3pm to 6 pm. Admission is free.