Walter Meyer responds to me:

>>But the painting has already been sold subject to an export licence and
>>the money being raised to keep it in the UK.
>
>Do we know to whom?

I don't.

>I just finished reading *The DaVinci Codes* in which the two Leonardo
>*Madonnas of the Rocks* are described.  According to the book the painting
>was commissioned by an order of nuns who objected to the first version,
>which now hangs in the Louvre, because the expressions and gestures
>suggested a disturbing and unacceptable symbolic message.  Leonardo
>painted a more sanitized version which was accepted.  That's the one now
>hanging in London.

Yes I saw that the last time I went. There is also a cartoon by Leonardo
(I forget the title) there as well in a special display to preserve it
from too much sunlight.  Because of the special display appararently people
spend more time looking at it than the painting of the Madonna of the Rocks.
I have visited the Lourve as well but the room with the Leonardos (Mona Lisa
as well) was very crowded, more like a scrum than an art gallery that I
couldn't really appreciate its greatness.  >Didn't (Dame) Myra Hess give
regular daytime recitals there (National Gallery) during WWII?  Yes the
concerts were daily.  The first concert was of Beethoven's Appassionata
and Bach's Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring.

Tim Horwood