Milan museum tickets reservation - Last supper tickets online booking

Overview

See three absolute highlights of Italian art and culture on the same date: One of the greatest masterpieces in the history of art (Leonardo da Vinci's Last Supper), one of the most important collections of manuscripts, prints, and drawings in the world (theAmbrosiana Library), and Leonardo da Vinci's largest and most breathtaking collection of papers, spanning forty years of his prolific intellectual life (the Codex Atlanticus). Purchase your Combo Ticket with us and secure your access to these highly popular destinations!

Combo Ticket Leonardo da Vinci's Last Supper + Exhibition Codex Atlanticus at Bramante's Sacristy and Ambrosiana Library: visit the three museums on the same date!

Choose your preferred date and time to see Leonardo's Last Supper, and we will confirm the closest available time on the same date, including tickets to Bramante's Sacristy (located in the same museum complex) 30 minutes later, and to the Ambrosiana Library for the other half of the same day.

PLEASE NOTE:
You will receive one voucher for each museum. You must print all three vouchers and present them no later than 15 minutes before each confirmed time.

IMPORTANT: the availability of tickets is not the same for all the combo packages. If you don't find availability for the desired date for this combo, please check the other combo packages too.

Reservations must be made with a minimum of 7 days notice.

Extensive measures have been taken to protect Leonardo da Vinci's Cenacolo (Last Supper)fresco from further damage. To ensure that the fresco is kept at room temperature, admission has been restricted to a maximum of 25 visitors at any one time since the 1999 reopening.

You can also add a guide for your visit to the Last Supper. Guided visits are available in English, Italian, French, German, Spanish, or Japanese.

Works on display in the Codex Atlanticus exhibition:
Ambrosiana Library:

Sacristy:
        Exhibition of Codex Atlanticus pages by Leonardo da Vinci


SPECIAL EXHIBITIONS
(Part of the Codex Atlanticus show)

September 7 - December 19, 2010:
Leonardo's Weapons and War Machines
This new selection of pages from the Codex Atlanticus shows a group of extraordinary drawings by Leonardo da Vinci. Chosen by curator Matthew Landrus, these extraordinary plans for machines of war, assault, and defense are among the most representative created by the master.

December 21, 2010 - March 13, 2011:
Leonardo's Machines for Architecture and Territory

March 15 - June 12, 2011:
Leonardo and his School: Animal Figures and Drawings

June 14 - September 11, 2011:
Leonardo: Studies of Movement

September 13 - December 11, 2011:
Sun and Moon: Leonardo's Astronomy and Cosmology

From December 13, 2011 - March 2012:
Botany, Interlace, and Ornamentation by Leonardo

IMPORTANT:
Due to the quantity of requests, your order IS CONFIRMED ONLY AFTER you receive the confirmation voucher, one business day after placing your order.

PLEASE NOTE:
Immediately after submitting your order, you will receive an email with your order summary and an email confirming your successful payment. A confirmation email with links to the vouchers will be sent one business day after you place your order (Monday afternoon for orders submitted on Friday and during the weekend). Please make sure that your anti-spam filter does not block automatic emails from help@waf.it.

PLEASE NOTE: The time you select on the order form is your preferred time. The museum will automatically confirm the closest available time, which can be any time during opening hours on the selected date, if your preferred time is no longer available.

CANCELLATION POLICY:
Once confirmed, a visit CANNOT be modified nor canceled.


ADMISSIONS AND OPENING HOURS:

Cenacolo Vinciano (The Last Supper)
Tuesday to Sunday from 8:15am to 7:00pm
Last admission at 6:45pm.
Admissionfor a maximum of 25 visitors at any one time.
Reservations are required for any kind of ticket.
The museum is closed on January 1, May 1,  and December 25.

How to get to there:

Sacrestia Monumentale del Bramante
Basilica di Santa Maria delle Grazie
Entrance from Via Caradosso 1, Milan
Tuesday to Sunday from 8:30am to 7:00pm
Entrance every 30 minutes
The museum is closed on January 1, Easter, May 1 and December 25.
Duration of the visit: about 20 minutes

Veneranda Biblioteca Ambrosiana
Piazza Pio XI 2, Milan
Tuesday to Sunday from 10:00am to 6:00pm
Entrance every 30 minutes
The museum is closed on January 1, Easter, May 1 and December 25.
Duration of the visit: about 1 hour

How to transfer between Bramante's Sacristy and Ambrosiana:

Tram 16: from Via Mazzini close to the Duomo – in front of Piazza di Santa Maria delle Grazie

Metro Red Line (stop for Ambrosiana: Duomo, stop for the Sacristy: Cadorna or Conciliazione)

Tram 19 connects Via Cantù (in front of the Ambrosiana) with Piazza Virgilio (behind Via Paradosso, the street behind Santa Maria delle Grazie Church)

Details

Leonardo da Vinci's Last Supper

One of the greatest masterpieces in the history of art is located in the refectory of the 15th century church of Santa Maria delle Grazie: Leonardo da Vinci's Last Supper. The building of the magnificent Renaissance church and the attached refectory were commissioned by Ludovico il Moro in 1463.

Duke Ludovico il Moro chose the Dominican church of Santa Maria delle Grazie as the mausoleum for himself and his family. For this purpose, he commissioned architect Donato Bramante with the construction of a monumental chancel topped by a decorated dome.

Work on the project began in 1492. Bramante also designed the marble doorway, the old sacristy and the charmingly named small cloister "of the frogs." Lombard Renaissance masters including Butinone, Zenale and Gaudenzio Ferrari decorated the interior with frescoes.

Leonardo da Vinci was commissioned during this time (1494) to create a fresco for the north wall of the refectory. Leonardo completed the work in 1498, one year before the French seized Milan and ended the grandiose funerary projects of Ludovico il Moro.

The painting illustrates one of the most intense emotional moments of the New Testament. While the Last Supper is a typical subject chosen for the decoration of many a refectory, Leonardo chose to capture the moment immediately after Christ's announcement that one of his apostles would betray him.

The scene is set in a room with a coffered ceiling whose walls are decorated with tapestries (this portion of the fresco has not been cleaned). Three windows open onto a landscape in the background.

Light from a seemingly natural source shines on the scene from the left, allowing Leonardo to reproduce the phenomena that he observed in nature: just as the waves spread in circles when a pebble is dropped in water, so does the effect of Christ's words reach the apostles.

Because of the experimental technique the great master adopted to paint it, Leonardo's Last Supper showed signs of decay soon after its creation. Leonardo chose to use tempera on a gesso base instead of the usual "a buon fresco" method, rendering the paint unstable. Its condition was made worse by continuous attempts to touch it up and consolidate it over the next few centuries.

Fortunately The Last Supper, together with the Crucifixion fresco by Montorfano on the opposite wall survived even the World War II bombings that destroyed the rest of the refectory.

The last restoration took over 20 years and was completed in 1999. It succeeded in recovering original parts of Leonardo's masterpiece, and although the fresco is fragmentary, it is finally possible to experience its true beauty.

Leonardo’s Codex Atlanticus

Milan - Symbol of the Renaissance

Fifteenth century Milan became the European capital of art and culture thanks to the Visconti and Sforza families, and to Ludovico il Moro. Exceptional artists such as Bramante and Leonardo da Vinci visited Milan, which became the heart of Renaissance art.

Santa Maria delle Grazie and the Bramante's Sacristy

The church of Santa Maria delle Grazie was built from 1465 to 1482 by Guiniforte Solari. Starting in 1490 Ludovico il Moro ordered important architectural changes. He commissioned Bramante with building the new tribune, and Leonardo da Vinci with painting The Last Supper. Bramante enlarged the church with a great Renaissance tribune, adding the cloister and the new sacristy.

The cloister is formed by lateral arches that rest on columns with Renaissance capitals.The Sacristy is characterized by rigorous geometric design, complete with cornice moldings, frames, and tondi (round paintings). Beautiful cabinets cover the four walls. These were initially inlaid and then completed with paintings.

The Ambrosiana Library, Art Gallery and Academy:

A welcoming place for those "who love beauty and look for truth, moved by goodwill".

The Library

With close to 700,000 prints, including thousands of incunabula,15,000 manuscripts - in addition to the famous Codex Atlanticus - the Ambrosiana Library has two of the 10 most important manuscripts in the world in Italian, Latin, Greek, Arabian, Syriac, Ethiopian, and other languages. The library’s collection includes 12,000 drawings by artists such as Raphael, Pisanello, and Leonardo, plus other rarities such as ancient maps, music manuscripts, parchments and papyrus. The Ambrosiana Library collectionis one of the most important in the world.

The Art Gallery

Cardinal Federico Borromeo's 1618 donation of passionately collected works of art form the original core of the Art Gallery. The Cardinal created the gallery to contribute to the training of young artists for whom Borromeo was preparing an Academy for painting, sculpture, and architecture.

But the collection, composed in part of religious art and partly of works portraying nature, reveals that the goal of the founder went further: Cardinal Borromeo was devoted to cultivating the public's enjoyment of beauty, considered a central element necessary for the human and Christian growth of the Milanese people.

The New Leonardo Room

A new room, the Ambrosiana Art Gallery, is entirely dedicated to Leonardo da Vinci. Leonardo's painting, The Musician, as well as paintings by Leonardo’s followers are preserved at the Ambrosiana, in the room that currently hosts the Luini fresco. It was specially restored for this occasion by Professoressa Pinin Brambilla, the famous restorer of the Last Supper.

A forgotten Meeting: Bramante and Leonardo in Milan

The Veneranda Biblioteca Ambrosiana is proposing a special exhibition commemorating this almost forgotten meeting. The library does so with three goals in mind: to celebrate beauty, to recover a historic memory, and to reveal unknown masterpieces to the public.

The Veneranda Biblioteca Ambrosiana and the Fondazione Cardinale Federico Borromeo, together with the Dominican Friars of Santa Maria delle Grazie, are exhibiting some pages of the Codex Atlanticus by Leonardo in the monumental and evocative Sacristy of Santa Maria delle Grazie by Bramante.

You are not only invited to visit Leonardo da Vinci's masterpiece The Last Supper, but also to admire the drawings by the master and to experience the great collection of paintings and books of the Ambrosiana Library.

The Codex Atlanticus. Air, Water, Earth and Fire. History in Movement.

The Codex Atlanticus it is the largest and most breathtaking collection of papers by Leonardo da Vinci. The name comes from its impressive size, typical for an Atlas (650 x 440 mm). At the end of the 16th century, the sculptor Pompeo Leoni put the more than 1,700 texts and drawings by the master together in a large single volume of 402 pages. It was donated to the Biblioteca Ambrosiana together with 11 other manuscripts in 1637. Confiscated by Napoleon and taken to Paris, the Codex Atlanticus was later returned to its original home never to leave it again.

The collected material covers the whole intellectual life of Leonardo, spanning over 40 years, from 1478 to 1519. Represented here are:

• Leonardo's contributions to mechanics, mathematics, history, botany, geography, physics, chemistry and architecture

• The master's drawings of war devices, underwater and flying machines, tools, architecture and urban design projects

• Theoretical and technical principles of painting, sculpture, optics and perspective

• Fables, tales and philosophic meditations

Prices

Full Price

Reduced Prices
Reduced Price 1:European Union and EES (Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, Switzerland) citizens between 18 and 25 years old

Reduced Price 2: European Union and EES (Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, Switzerland) citizens between 15 and 17 years old and seniors over 65 years old


Free Admission
European Union and EES (Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, Switzerland) citizens under 14 years old

Reviews