Motives behind art? John the Baptist is said to have lived in the wilderness, where he survived by eating insects and wild honey. He traditionally is depicted as a gaunt individual surviving in a rugged environment, as in the image on the left. The Renaissance artist Leonardo da Vinci depicted him as on the right. Why? Sigmund Freud suggested that the motivation behind da Vinci’s work was not primarily spiritual or artistic, but sexual. Da Vinci’s homosexual sexual energies, Freud claimed, powered his art, resulting in a John the Baptist with soft features, flowing curly hair, and ambiguous sexuality.