With reference to London’s National Gallery’s Leonardo Da Vinci: Painter at the Court of Milan show, Richard Dorment writes in The Telegraph:
The last picture in the show is a newly attributed Christ as the Saviour of the World. In reproduction, it looks like the kind of creepy 19th-century symbolist picture that would have interested Madame Blavatsky. But seen face to face, the miraculous handling of the hand raised in blessing, the rock crystal orb, and hair all add up to convincing arguments in favour of Leonardo’s authorship. Still, it looks like nothing else in the show. The hypnotic head and upper torso fill the panel edge to edge like an icon, whereas Leonardo’s figures move, torque, and engage with the atmosphere around them. Perhaps its strangeness can be accounted for by the commission. Was it meant to be seen from afar, or to be carried in a procession like a banner? Certainly it is related to the image of Christ’s face imprinted on the Sudarium, or veil of Veronica, which was venerated as one of the most famous relics in Christendom. All I can say is that if Leonardo did paint it then I’ll bet a fiver he’s also the joker behind the Turin Shroud.
Leonardo da Vinci: Painter at the Court of Milan, National Gallery in London: review – Telegraph