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On May 2, 1519, Leonardo da Vinci, Italian painter, sculptor, scientist, and visionary, died at the age of 67.
Leonardo da Vinci
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Leonardo da Vinci: The Renaissance Man
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Thank you my friend SGT (Join to see) for making us aware that on May 2, 1519 Italian painter, sculptor, scientist, and visionary Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci died at the age of 67.
Leonardo da Vinci: The Renaissance Man
https://youtu.be/rO8ZD-LVisc?t=14
Images:
1. Leonardo da Vinci 'The Last Supper'
2. Leonardo da Vinci self-portrait
3. Mona Lisa (1505) by Leonardo da Vinci - Oil on a Poplar Panel [Mona Lisa is a painting of Lisa del Giocondo, the wife of Italian silk merchant Francesco del Giocondo. The couple commissioned the painting to hang in their new home, and to celebrate the birth of Andrea, their second son.]
4. The Virgin on the Rocks (c. 1505-1508) by Leonardo da Vinci - Oil on Wood Panel
Background from {{https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/article/leonardo-da-vinci-genius-walter-isaacson]}
Leonardo da Vinci was many things: a painter, an architect, an engineer, a theatrical producer—and gay, illegitimate, and wildly popular in Renaissance-era Italy.
PHOTOGRAPH BY DEAGOSTINI, GETTY
What Made Leonardo da Vinci a Genius?
Hint: The great Italian artist was interested in everything.
BY SIMON WORRALL
PUBLISHED NOVEMBER 4, 2017
Today, the term “genius” is bandied about to describe pop stars, stand-up comedians, and even footballers. But Leonardo da Vinci earned the description, explains Walter Isaacson in his lavishly illustrated new biography. From iconic paintings—“Mona Lisa” and “The Last Supper”—to designs for flying machines and ground-breaking studies on optics and perspective, Leonardo fused science and art to create works that have become part of humanity’s story. [Find out what science tells us about geniuses.]
When National Geographic caught up with Isaacson by phone at his home in Washington, D.C., he explained why Mona Lisa’s smile is the culmination of a lifetime of inquiry; how Michelangelo and Leonardo couldn’t stand each other; and why being curious was Leonardo’s defining trait.
We have to start with the most famous smile in the world. Where does the “Mona Lisa” fit into Leonardo’s life and work—and how has she managed to bewitch us for 500 years?
The Mona Lisa’s smile is the culmination of a lifetime spent studying art, science, optics, and every other possible field that he could apply his curiosity to, including understanding the universe and how we fit into it.
Leonardo spent many pages in his notebook dissecting the human face to figure out every muscle and nerve that touched the lips. On one of those pages you see a faint sketch at the top of the beginning of the smile of the Mona Lisa. Leonardo kept that painting from 1503, when he started it, to his deathbed in 1519, trying to get every aspect exactly right in layer after layer. During that period, he dissected the human eye on cadavers and was able to understand that the center of the retina sees detail, but the edges see shadows and shapes better. If you look directly at the Mona Lisa smile, the corners of the lips turn downward slightly, but shadows and light make it seem like it’s turning upwards. As you move your eyes across her face the smile flickers on and off.
He carried his notebook around as he walked through Florence or Milan, and always sketched people’s expressions and emotions and tried to relate that to the inner feelings they were having. You see that most obviously in “The Last Supper.”
But the “Mona Lisa” is the culmination because the emotions that she’s expressing, just like her smile, are a bit elusive. Every time you look at her it seems slightly different. Unlike other portraits of the time, this is not just a flat, surface depiction. It tries to depict the inner emotions.
His other most famous masterpiece is “The Last Supper,” which you call “the most spell-binding narrative painting in history.” Take us inside its creation—and explain why it is such a supreme work of art.
The Duke of Milan asked him to paint it on the wall of a dining hall of a monastery. Unlike other depictions of “The Last Supper,” of which there were hundreds at the time, Leonardo doesn’t just capture a moment. He understands that there is no such thing as a disconnected instant of time. He writes that any instant has what’s come before it and after it embodied into it, because it’s in motion.
So he makes “The Last Supper” a dramatic narrative. As you walk in the door, you see Christ’s hand then, going up the arm, you stare at his face. He’s saying, “One of you shall betray me.” As your eyes move across the picture, you see that sound almost rippling outward as each of the groups of apostles reacts.
Those nearest to him are already saying, “Is it me, Lord?” The ones further away have just started to hear it. As the drama ripples from the center to the edges, it seems to bounce back, as Christ reaches for the bread and wine, the beginning of what will be the institution of the Eucharist.
Despite these achievements, in his own day Leonardo wasn’t primarily known as a painter, was he, but as an architect—and even what we would today call a special effects guy. Unbraid these different strands of his life.
He was mainly, despite what he sometimes wished, a painter. He liked to think of himself as an engineer and architect, which he also did with great passion. But his first job was as a theatrical producer.
From that he learned how to do tricks with perspective because the stage in a theatre recedes faster and looks deeper than it is. Even a table onstage would be tilted slightly so you can see it, which is also what we see in “The Last Supper.” Likewise, on the stage, the theatrical gestures of the characters would be exaggerated, which is what you also see in “The Last Supper.”
His theatrical production led him to mechanical props, like flying machines and a helicopter screw, which were designed to bring angels down from the rafters in some of the performances. Leonardo then blurred the line between fantasy and reality when he went on to try to create real flying machines that were engineering marvels! So, what he picked up in the theatre he brought both to his art and real-life engineering.
What about Leonardo, the man? He was a vegetarian and openly gay, in an age when sodomy was a crime, and quite a dandy. Unpack these different aspects of his character.
He was gay, illegitimate, left handed, a bit of a heretic, but the good thing about Florence was that it was a very tolerant city in the 1470s. Leonardo would go around town wearing short, purple and pink outfits that were somewhat surprising to the people of Florence, but he was very popular. He had an enormous number of friends both in Florence and Milan. He records many dinners with close friends, who were a diverse group: mathematicians, architects, playwrights, engineers, and poets. That diversity helped shape him.
Finally, he was a very good-looking guy. If you look at “Vitruvian Man,” the guy standing nude in the circle and square, that’s largely a self-portrait of Leonardo with his flowing curls and well-proportioned body.
There was a well-known, and mutual, dislike between Leonardo and Michelangelo. Explain the animosity—and set the scene for what became a kind of painterly “high noon” between them.
Leonardo and Michelangelo were very different. Leonardo was popular, sociable, and comfortable with all his eccentricities, including being gay. Michelangelo was also gay but deeply felt the agony and the ecstasy of his identity. He also was very much of a recluse. He had no very close friends, wore dark clothes, so they were polar opposites in look, style, and personality.
They were also very different in their art styles. Michelangelo painted as if he were a sculptor, using very sharp lines. Leonardo believed in sfumato, the blurring of lines, because he felt that was the way we actually see reality.
The rulers of Florence created a competition for both of them to paint battle scenes in the Council Hall. By that point, the rivalry had become bad.
Leonardo had voted to have Michelangelo’s statue of David hidden away in some arcade rather than placed in the middle of the plaza. Michelangelo had been publicly rude to Leonardo. All of this had caused a certain electricity, so the rulers of Florence pitted them against each other to do these two battle drawings.
In the end they both flinched, quitting before they finished the paintings. Then Leonardo moved back to Milan and Michelangelo moved to Rome to work on the Sistine Chapel.
Leonardo never signed his paintings, which has sometimes caused confusion. Tell us the amazing story of “La Bella Principessa”—and the Sherlock Holmes-type investigation to establish its authenticity.
“La Bella Principessa” is a chalk drawing that turned up at auction a few decades ago. It was never thought to be a Leonardo, and sold very inexpensively because they thought it was a German copy of a Florentine artist.
But one art collector was convinced that it was an authentic Leonardo. He bought it and took it around the world to experts to determine whether it truly was a Leonardo. It was pretty much confirmed when they found fingerprints because Leonardo often smudged his work using his thumb.
Then it turned out that the guy who made that claim was a bit unreliable and perhaps even fraudulent so the claim was withdrawn. Finally, with the help of Martin Kemp, the great Oxford Leonardo scholar, they discovered that it was a drawing made by Leonardo, which had been the front piece of a book that was in a library in Poland where somebody had cut it out.
More recently, we have the tale of Salvator Mundi, a beautiful painting that goes on sale November 15th at Christies. For a long time, we also thought this was a copy but in the past ten years it’s been authenticated. It was sold a decade ago for about $100. In November, it’ll probably go for more than $100 million. [It sold for $450.3 million.]
It’ll be a major event because it’s the only Leonardo painting in private hands. Nobody will probably ever be able to buy a Leonardo painting again.
One of the natural elements that most fascinated Leonardo, and to which he returned at the end of his life, was water. What did he see in it?
He was a self-taught kid. He didn’t go to school because he was born out of wedlock and among the things he loved was the flow of the streams that went into the Arno River. He studied those, and from his childhood to his deathbed, he was still drawing the spiral forms and trying to figure out the math behind them.
That translates both into a science and his art. He loved how air currents formed little flurries when they went over the curved wings of birds and realized that they helped keep the bird aloft, something we now know about airplanes.
In any of his masterworks, including the “Mona Lisa,” you see a winding river, as though it connects to the blood veins of the person in the portrait, like a connection of the human to the earth.
What do you think is the defining trait of Leonardo’s genius? And what can he teach us?
In the last chapter, I try to answer that with 25 lessons from Leonardo, that also distill lessons from previous books I’ve written on Steve Jobs or Albert Einstein. In all those books, I’ve noticed that creativity comes from connecting art to science. To be really creative, you have to be interested in all sorts of different disciplines rather than be a specialist.
The ultimate example of that is Leonardo da Vinci, who is interested in everything that could possibly be known about the universe, including how we fit into it. That made him a joyous character to write about.
In his notebooks, we see such questions as, describe the tongue of the woodpecker. Why do people yawn? Why is the sky blue? He is passionately curious about everyday phenomenon that most of us quit questioning once we get out of our wonder years and become a bit jaded.
Being curious about everything and curious just for curiosity’s sake, not simply because it’s useful, is the defining trait of Leonardo. It’s how he pushed himself and taught himself to be a genius. We’ll never emulate Einstein’s mathematical ability. But we can all try to learn from, and copy, Leonardo’s curiosity.
This interview was edited for length and clarity."
FYI COL Mikel J. Burroughs SMSgt Lawrence McCarter SPC Michael Duricko, Ph.D GySgt Thomas Vick SGT Denny Espinosa SPC Matthew Lamb LTC (Join to see)Maj Bill Smith, Ph.D. MAJ Dale E. Wilson, Ph.D. PO1 William "Chip" Nagel PO2 (Join to see) SSG Franklin Briant SPC Woody Bullard TSgt David L. SPC Michael Terrell SFC Chuck Martinez CSM Charles HaydenSSG Bill McCoy SMSgt Tom Burns
Leonardo da Vinci: The Renaissance Man
https://youtu.be/rO8ZD-LVisc?t=14
Images:
1. Leonardo da Vinci 'The Last Supper'
2. Leonardo da Vinci self-portrait
3. Mona Lisa (1505) by Leonardo da Vinci - Oil on a Poplar Panel [Mona Lisa is a painting of Lisa del Giocondo, the wife of Italian silk merchant Francesco del Giocondo. The couple commissioned the painting to hang in their new home, and to celebrate the birth of Andrea, their second son.]
4. The Virgin on the Rocks (c. 1505-1508) by Leonardo da Vinci - Oil on Wood Panel
Background from {{https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/article/leonardo-da-vinci-genius-walter-isaacson]}
Leonardo da Vinci was many things: a painter, an architect, an engineer, a theatrical producer—and gay, illegitimate, and wildly popular in Renaissance-era Italy.
PHOTOGRAPH BY DEAGOSTINI, GETTY
What Made Leonardo da Vinci a Genius?
Hint: The great Italian artist was interested in everything.
BY SIMON WORRALL
PUBLISHED NOVEMBER 4, 2017
Today, the term “genius” is bandied about to describe pop stars, stand-up comedians, and even footballers. But Leonardo da Vinci earned the description, explains Walter Isaacson in his lavishly illustrated new biography. From iconic paintings—“Mona Lisa” and “The Last Supper”—to designs for flying machines and ground-breaking studies on optics and perspective, Leonardo fused science and art to create works that have become part of humanity’s story. [Find out what science tells us about geniuses.]
When National Geographic caught up with Isaacson by phone at his home in Washington, D.C., he explained why Mona Lisa’s smile is the culmination of a lifetime of inquiry; how Michelangelo and Leonardo couldn’t stand each other; and why being curious was Leonardo’s defining trait.
We have to start with the most famous smile in the world. Where does the “Mona Lisa” fit into Leonardo’s life and work—and how has she managed to bewitch us for 500 years?
The Mona Lisa’s smile is the culmination of a lifetime spent studying art, science, optics, and every other possible field that he could apply his curiosity to, including understanding the universe and how we fit into it.
Leonardo spent many pages in his notebook dissecting the human face to figure out every muscle and nerve that touched the lips. On one of those pages you see a faint sketch at the top of the beginning of the smile of the Mona Lisa. Leonardo kept that painting from 1503, when he started it, to his deathbed in 1519, trying to get every aspect exactly right in layer after layer. During that period, he dissected the human eye on cadavers and was able to understand that the center of the retina sees detail, but the edges see shadows and shapes better. If you look directly at the Mona Lisa smile, the corners of the lips turn downward slightly, but shadows and light make it seem like it’s turning upwards. As you move your eyes across her face the smile flickers on and off.
He carried his notebook around as he walked through Florence or Milan, and always sketched people’s expressions and emotions and tried to relate that to the inner feelings they were having. You see that most obviously in “The Last Supper.”
But the “Mona Lisa” is the culmination because the emotions that she’s expressing, just like her smile, are a bit elusive. Every time you look at her it seems slightly different. Unlike other portraits of the time, this is not just a flat, surface depiction. It tries to depict the inner emotions.
His other most famous masterpiece is “The Last Supper,” which you call “the most spell-binding narrative painting in history.” Take us inside its creation—and explain why it is such a supreme work of art.
The Duke of Milan asked him to paint it on the wall of a dining hall of a monastery. Unlike other depictions of “The Last Supper,” of which there were hundreds at the time, Leonardo doesn’t just capture a moment. He understands that there is no such thing as a disconnected instant of time. He writes that any instant has what’s come before it and after it embodied into it, because it’s in motion.
So he makes “The Last Supper” a dramatic narrative. As you walk in the door, you see Christ’s hand then, going up the arm, you stare at his face. He’s saying, “One of you shall betray me.” As your eyes move across the picture, you see that sound almost rippling outward as each of the groups of apostles reacts.
Those nearest to him are already saying, “Is it me, Lord?” The ones further away have just started to hear it. As the drama ripples from the center to the edges, it seems to bounce back, as Christ reaches for the bread and wine, the beginning of what will be the institution of the Eucharist.
Despite these achievements, in his own day Leonardo wasn’t primarily known as a painter, was he, but as an architect—and even what we would today call a special effects guy. Unbraid these different strands of his life.
He was mainly, despite what he sometimes wished, a painter. He liked to think of himself as an engineer and architect, which he also did with great passion. But his first job was as a theatrical producer.
From that he learned how to do tricks with perspective because the stage in a theatre recedes faster and looks deeper than it is. Even a table onstage would be tilted slightly so you can see it, which is also what we see in “The Last Supper.” Likewise, on the stage, the theatrical gestures of the characters would be exaggerated, which is what you also see in “The Last Supper.”
His theatrical production led him to mechanical props, like flying machines and a helicopter screw, which were designed to bring angels down from the rafters in some of the performances. Leonardo then blurred the line between fantasy and reality when he went on to try to create real flying machines that were engineering marvels! So, what he picked up in the theatre he brought both to his art and real-life engineering.
What about Leonardo, the man? He was a vegetarian and openly gay, in an age when sodomy was a crime, and quite a dandy. Unpack these different aspects of his character.
He was gay, illegitimate, left handed, a bit of a heretic, but the good thing about Florence was that it was a very tolerant city in the 1470s. Leonardo would go around town wearing short, purple and pink outfits that were somewhat surprising to the people of Florence, but he was very popular. He had an enormous number of friends both in Florence and Milan. He records many dinners with close friends, who were a diverse group: mathematicians, architects, playwrights, engineers, and poets. That diversity helped shape him.
Finally, he was a very good-looking guy. If you look at “Vitruvian Man,” the guy standing nude in the circle and square, that’s largely a self-portrait of Leonardo with his flowing curls and well-proportioned body.
There was a well-known, and mutual, dislike between Leonardo and Michelangelo. Explain the animosity—and set the scene for what became a kind of painterly “high noon” between them.
Leonardo and Michelangelo were very different. Leonardo was popular, sociable, and comfortable with all his eccentricities, including being gay. Michelangelo was also gay but deeply felt the agony and the ecstasy of his identity. He also was very much of a recluse. He had no very close friends, wore dark clothes, so they were polar opposites in look, style, and personality.
They were also very different in their art styles. Michelangelo painted as if he were a sculptor, using very sharp lines. Leonardo believed in sfumato, the blurring of lines, because he felt that was the way we actually see reality.
The rulers of Florence created a competition for both of them to paint battle scenes in the Council Hall. By that point, the rivalry had become bad.
Leonardo had voted to have Michelangelo’s statue of David hidden away in some arcade rather than placed in the middle of the plaza. Michelangelo had been publicly rude to Leonardo. All of this had caused a certain electricity, so the rulers of Florence pitted them against each other to do these two battle drawings.
In the end they both flinched, quitting before they finished the paintings. Then Leonardo moved back to Milan and Michelangelo moved to Rome to work on the Sistine Chapel.
Leonardo never signed his paintings, which has sometimes caused confusion. Tell us the amazing story of “La Bella Principessa”—and the Sherlock Holmes-type investigation to establish its authenticity.
“La Bella Principessa” is a chalk drawing that turned up at auction a few decades ago. It was never thought to be a Leonardo, and sold very inexpensively because they thought it was a German copy of a Florentine artist.
But one art collector was convinced that it was an authentic Leonardo. He bought it and took it around the world to experts to determine whether it truly was a Leonardo. It was pretty much confirmed when they found fingerprints because Leonardo often smudged his work using his thumb.
Then it turned out that the guy who made that claim was a bit unreliable and perhaps even fraudulent so the claim was withdrawn. Finally, with the help of Martin Kemp, the great Oxford Leonardo scholar, they discovered that it was a drawing made by Leonardo, which had been the front piece of a book that was in a library in Poland where somebody had cut it out.
More recently, we have the tale of Salvator Mundi, a beautiful painting that goes on sale November 15th at Christies. For a long time, we also thought this was a copy but in the past ten years it’s been authenticated. It was sold a decade ago for about $100. In November, it’ll probably go for more than $100 million. [It sold for $450.3 million.]
It’ll be a major event because it’s the only Leonardo painting in private hands. Nobody will probably ever be able to buy a Leonardo painting again.
One of the natural elements that most fascinated Leonardo, and to which he returned at the end of his life, was water. What did he see in it?
He was a self-taught kid. He didn’t go to school because he was born out of wedlock and among the things he loved was the flow of the streams that went into the Arno River. He studied those, and from his childhood to his deathbed, he was still drawing the spiral forms and trying to figure out the math behind them.
That translates both into a science and his art. He loved how air currents formed little flurries when they went over the curved wings of birds and realized that they helped keep the bird aloft, something we now know about airplanes.
In any of his masterworks, including the “Mona Lisa,” you see a winding river, as though it connects to the blood veins of the person in the portrait, like a connection of the human to the earth.
What do you think is the defining trait of Leonardo’s genius? And what can he teach us?
In the last chapter, I try to answer that with 25 lessons from Leonardo, that also distill lessons from previous books I’ve written on Steve Jobs or Albert Einstein. In all those books, I’ve noticed that creativity comes from connecting art to science. To be really creative, you have to be interested in all sorts of different disciplines rather than be a specialist.
The ultimate example of that is Leonardo da Vinci, who is interested in everything that could possibly be known about the universe, including how we fit into it. That made him a joyous character to write about.
In his notebooks, we see such questions as, describe the tongue of the woodpecker. Why do people yawn? Why is the sky blue? He is passionately curious about everyday phenomenon that most of us quit questioning once we get out of our wonder years and become a bit jaded.
Being curious about everything and curious just for curiosity’s sake, not simply because it’s useful, is the defining trait of Leonardo. It’s how he pushed himself and taught himself to be a genius. We’ll never emulate Einstein’s mathematical ability. But we can all try to learn from, and copy, Leonardo’s curiosity.
This interview was edited for length and clarity."
FYI COL Mikel J. Burroughs SMSgt Lawrence McCarter SPC Michael Duricko, Ph.D GySgt Thomas Vick SGT Denny Espinosa SPC Matthew Lamb LTC (Join to see)Maj Bill Smith, Ph.D. MAJ Dale E. Wilson, Ph.D. PO1 William "Chip" Nagel PO2 (Join to see) SSG Franklin Briant SPC Woody Bullard TSgt David L. SPC Michael Terrell SFC Chuck Martinez CSM Charles HaydenSSG Bill McCoy SMSgt Tom Burns
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LTC Stephen F.
Da Vinci Inventions Documentary
Renowned as the Mind of the Renaissance, the genius of Leonardo da Vinci reaches beyond the centuries. Painter, sculptor, engineer, and scientist, in each fi...
Da Vinci Inventions Documentary
https://youtu.be/VDR1Auc3ajc?t=21
Images:
1. Portrait of Leonardo da Vinci by Lattanzio Querena
2. Leonardo Da Vinci 'The Baptism of Christ Detail' 1472-75
3. 1488-1505 Leonardo da Vinci, Flying machine.
4. Leonardo da Vinci masterpiece 'The Battle of Anghiari'
Background from {[leonardodavinci.net biography of Leonardo da Vinci]}
Leonardo da Vinci was a prominent name not only during the Italian Renaissance, but is still recognized as one of the most well-known names in the art world today. He was a prominent figure, intellectual, and one of the leading artists that made a name for themselves during the Renaissance. Not only is he known for some of the most famous pieces to come out of this period in the art world, but throughout any period of time in art history. Of course, The Last Supper, and The Mona Lisa, are a couple of his most famous pieces, but Leonardo da Vinci also worked on a series of other works during his career, and crafted plenty of pieces which have withstood the test of time, and are still considered masterpieces to this day.
Early Life
Born in 1452 in Vinci, Italy, Leonardo da Vinci focused on the laws of sciences and nature early in his life. This respect and knowledge allowed him to depict these things in his artwork. They not only helped inform him as a painter, but also as a sculptor, draftsmen, and an inventor. Not only have his works become some of the most well known in the art world, but they also served as inspiration to many other artists during his time, and still to this day. Further, they made him a prominent figure during the Renaissance period, for his forward-thinking, and distinct view on images he created during the period.
Young Career
At the age of 14 Leonardo da Vinci worked as an apprentice to Verrocchio. During this six year period he learned several different techniques and technical skills. This included in metal working, working with leather, the arts, carving, sculpting, and of course drawing and painting. By the age of 20 he had become a master craftsman of the guild, and had opened his own studio at this young age. For a couple years he remained out of the public eye, following the period where he was charged with and acquitted of having committed sodomy. Up until about the age of 22, he really did not focus much on his works.
The Last Supper
Lorenzo de Medici commissioned Leonardo da Vinci in 1482, to create a piece for the Duke of Monaco, which was being done as a gesture of peace. In addition to creating the piece, he wrote a letter explaining how he would be the perfect painter, and how he could work for the court. After the piece and his letter were accepted, Leonardo da Vinci was commissioned to work from 1482 up until 1499 by the court. Although he worked on many individual pieces during this time, a few which did become famous pieces, it was also during this time when he crafted one of his most well-known pieces, The Last Supper.
Mona Lisa
Between 1505 to 1507 Leonardo da Vinci was commissioned for private work. It was during this period that he not only created his most famous piece of artwork, but also possibly one of the most well known, and the most famous pieces of artwork which has ever been crafted in the world, The Mona Lisa. There were many theories and stories behind this piece. Some included that she had jaundice, many thought it was a piece of a pregnant woman, and others claim it is not a woman at all, but a man dressed in drag. Although no accounts are proven, there are many theories surrounding this piece, and this is what gives it so much allure.
The Mona Lisa was also a constant work in progress for Leonardo da Vinci; it was a piece he never quite finished, and was always trying to perfect. The painting itself was never given to the commissioner who had hired him for the work, and was kept with him until his death. It is currently in the Louvre in Paris, and is protected by the thickest bulletproof glass. It is not only considered to be a national treasure, it is also considered the most famous art piece to have been created, by any artist, during any period or form of art.
More than an Artist
Leonardo da Vinci was said to be a Renaissance man, who had far more to offer to the world during his period than just art. His talents were noted to greatly exceed the arts of work that he created during his career. He did not create a divide between science and art, like many humanists of the time, which is what gave his work such depth, and so much character. Over 13,000 pages of notes documented his inventions, creations, observations, and drawings. Architecture and anatomy, designs for flying machines, plant studies, and other work he was involved in, were all documented in these pages.
Most of his ideas were theoretical and very rarely if ever experimental. He was also known to have been one of the first to document the human body in the form of a child, as he stayed as close as possible to the actual anatomy, and did not drift away from the sciences in his works. One of the last commissioned works that he created during his career was a mechanical lion. It could walk, and open its chest, which revealed a bouquet of lilies. He died soon after in 1519.
There are three classes of people: those who see. Those who see when they are shown. Those who do not see. ”- Leonardo da Vinci
Not only was Leonardo da Vinci one of the most influential figures during his time, but he was a leading Renaissance man. He was well ahead of his time, and he was more than just an artist. He was a great thinker, and he developed a series of great works and inventions during the course of his career. Although he did have a few issues early in his career, he moved past these and became one of the most well-known artists throughout history. Still to this day, his works remain some of the most famous throughout history, and still influence young artists working during this period in the art world."
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https://youtu.be/VDR1Auc3ajc?t=21
Images:
1. Portrait of Leonardo da Vinci by Lattanzio Querena
2. Leonardo Da Vinci 'The Baptism of Christ Detail' 1472-75
3. 1488-1505 Leonardo da Vinci, Flying machine.
4. Leonardo da Vinci masterpiece 'The Battle of Anghiari'
Background from {[leonardodavinci.net biography of Leonardo da Vinci]}
Leonardo da Vinci was a prominent name not only during the Italian Renaissance, but is still recognized as one of the most well-known names in the art world today. He was a prominent figure, intellectual, and one of the leading artists that made a name for themselves during the Renaissance. Not only is he known for some of the most famous pieces to come out of this period in the art world, but throughout any period of time in art history. Of course, The Last Supper, and The Mona Lisa, are a couple of his most famous pieces, but Leonardo da Vinci also worked on a series of other works during his career, and crafted plenty of pieces which have withstood the test of time, and are still considered masterpieces to this day.
Early Life
Born in 1452 in Vinci, Italy, Leonardo da Vinci focused on the laws of sciences and nature early in his life. This respect and knowledge allowed him to depict these things in his artwork. They not only helped inform him as a painter, but also as a sculptor, draftsmen, and an inventor. Not only have his works become some of the most well known in the art world, but they also served as inspiration to many other artists during his time, and still to this day. Further, they made him a prominent figure during the Renaissance period, for his forward-thinking, and distinct view on images he created during the period.
Young Career
At the age of 14 Leonardo da Vinci worked as an apprentice to Verrocchio. During this six year period he learned several different techniques and technical skills. This included in metal working, working with leather, the arts, carving, sculpting, and of course drawing and painting. By the age of 20 he had become a master craftsman of the guild, and had opened his own studio at this young age. For a couple years he remained out of the public eye, following the period where he was charged with and acquitted of having committed sodomy. Up until about the age of 22, he really did not focus much on his works.
The Last Supper
Lorenzo de Medici commissioned Leonardo da Vinci in 1482, to create a piece for the Duke of Monaco, which was being done as a gesture of peace. In addition to creating the piece, he wrote a letter explaining how he would be the perfect painter, and how he could work for the court. After the piece and his letter were accepted, Leonardo da Vinci was commissioned to work from 1482 up until 1499 by the court. Although he worked on many individual pieces during this time, a few which did become famous pieces, it was also during this time when he crafted one of his most well-known pieces, The Last Supper.
Mona Lisa
Between 1505 to 1507 Leonardo da Vinci was commissioned for private work. It was during this period that he not only created his most famous piece of artwork, but also possibly one of the most well known, and the most famous pieces of artwork which has ever been crafted in the world, The Mona Lisa. There were many theories and stories behind this piece. Some included that she had jaundice, many thought it was a piece of a pregnant woman, and others claim it is not a woman at all, but a man dressed in drag. Although no accounts are proven, there are many theories surrounding this piece, and this is what gives it so much allure.
The Mona Lisa was also a constant work in progress for Leonardo da Vinci; it was a piece he never quite finished, and was always trying to perfect. The painting itself was never given to the commissioner who had hired him for the work, and was kept with him until his death. It is currently in the Louvre in Paris, and is protected by the thickest bulletproof glass. It is not only considered to be a national treasure, it is also considered the most famous art piece to have been created, by any artist, during any period or form of art.
More than an Artist
Leonardo da Vinci was said to be a Renaissance man, who had far more to offer to the world during his period than just art. His talents were noted to greatly exceed the arts of work that he created during his career. He did not create a divide between science and art, like many humanists of the time, which is what gave his work such depth, and so much character. Over 13,000 pages of notes documented his inventions, creations, observations, and drawings. Architecture and anatomy, designs for flying machines, plant studies, and other work he was involved in, were all documented in these pages.
Most of his ideas were theoretical and very rarely if ever experimental. He was also known to have been one of the first to document the human body in the form of a child, as he stayed as close as possible to the actual anatomy, and did not drift away from the sciences in his works. One of the last commissioned works that he created during his career was a mechanical lion. It could walk, and open its chest, which revealed a bouquet of lilies. He died soon after in 1519.
There are three classes of people: those who see. Those who see when they are shown. Those who do not see. ”- Leonardo da Vinci
Not only was Leonardo da Vinci one of the most influential figures during his time, but he was a leading Renaissance man. He was well ahead of his time, and he was more than just an artist. He was a great thinker, and he developed a series of great works and inventions during the course of his career. Although he did have a few issues early in his career, he moved past these and became one of the most well-known artists throughout history. Still to this day, his works remain some of the most famous throughout history, and still influence young artists working during this period in the art world."
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Da Vinci's Lost Art (Art History Documentary) | Perspective
Subscribe and click the bell icon to get more arts content every week:https://tinyurl.com/yc3m7n4mHow lost works by Leonardo Da Vinci are being rediscovered ...
Da Vinci's Lost Art (Art History Documentary) | Perspective
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fkd6mr1QCBI
Images:
1. Leonardo da Vinci's water wheel
2. Leonardo da Vinci creative process Invention begins with abstract thinking
3. Leonardo da Vinci creative process An invention in its early stages
4. Leonardo da Vinci Detailed anatomical studies
Background from {[https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/502202/12-masterful-facts-about-leonardo-da-vinci]}
12 Masterful Facts About Leonardo Da Vinci BY JAKE ROSSEN
JUNE 29, 2017
(UPDATED: MAY 2, 2019)
There are few historical figures in the world with a creative reputation comparable to that of Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519), the celebrated figurehead of the Italian Renaissance. A polymath, Leonardo alternated stunning paintings (The Last Supper, Mona Lisa) with prescient sketches of inventions and engineering theory.
Although his life could fill several books (and has), we've rounded up some of the more compelling facts about Leonardo da Vinci's work.
1. YOU (PROBABLY) SHOULDN'T CALL HIM DA VINCI.
In modern American culture, it's customary to refer to people by their last name—though not always. Dante is a first name, as are Galileo, Michelangelo, and many other Italians from the period are known by first names. But historians have a different problem with Leonardo di Ser Piero da Vinci. You might think that it's obviously Mr. da Vinci—but da Vinci just means "of Vinci," in reference to where he was from, like Geoffrey of Monmouth or Philip of Macedon. Everywhere from great museums (like the Louvre and the Metropolitan Museum of Art) to auction houses and scholars refer to him as Leonardo (many blame The Da Vinci Code for the widespread usage of da Vinci as a last name).
There are other historians, though, arguing people can be overzealous in their quest for linguistic purity. According to journalist and historian Walter Isaacson, the "da Vinci" usage is incorrect, but not that terrible. "During Leonardo's lifetime, Italians increasingly began to regularize and register the use of hereditary surnames," Isaacson wrote in his 2017 biography Leonardo da Vinci. "When Leonardo moved to Milan, his friend the court poet Bernardo Bellincioni referred to him in writing as 'Leonardo Vinci, the Florentine.'"
Dr. Jill Burke of the University of Edinburgh argues that while da Vinci "might not be thought of as a 'proper' surname," it does "seem to be established as some kind of family name during Leonardo's lifetime. His father, after all, is called Ser Piero da Vinci. Contemporary documents use 'Vinci' pretty much as a surname … People don't ever call him just 'da Vinci' in the documents. But they don't call Lorenzo de' Medici just 'Medici' either. It's not a convention to use surnames in this way in the fifteenth century."
But, conventionally, Leonardo wins out.
2. LEONARDO WAS AN ILLEGITIMATE CHILD BORN DURING WHAT SCHOLARS HAVE CALLED A "'GOLDEN AGE' FOR BASTARDS."
Leonardo was born on April 15, 1452 to a fifth-generation notary, Piero, and an unmarried peasant girl named Caterina. In Isaacson's book, he opens with the argument that Leonardo "had the good luck to be born out of wedlock." If he had been a legitimate son, he would have been expected to follow in his father's line of work and become a notary, and "he would have been sent to one of the classical schools in Florence for the aspiring upper-middle classes and rising middle classes, or a university, and he would have been stuffed full of the medieval scholastic learning of the time," Isaacson told the podcast Recode/Decode. Instead, Leonardo was technically unschooled, but he was able to follow his curiosities and learn through experimentation—and he was free to go into any of the creative arts, like poetry, drawing, etc.
Another point Isaacson brings up was that being an illegitimate child did not carry the stigma then that it had in other eras. Leonardo's baptism was a large event, with 10 godparents present. He split his childhood between his parents' homes and his grandfather's, and eventually his father helped him land apprenticeships in Florence. Even ruling families like the Medicis and Borgias had plenty of illegitimate children who held rank and social prominence. No wonder scholars have deemed it a "golden age" for bastards.
3. A SODOMY CHARGE LED TO HIS 2-YEAR DISAPPEARANCE.
The Italy of the Middle Ages was not an era of particularly progressive thinking. After a young Leonardo showcased his aptitude for art early on, he was soon taken in by acclaimed artist Andrea del Verrocchio in Florence. Though a rich life following his creative pursuits seemed imminent, Leonardo's aspirations were temporarily derailed when he and several other young men were charged with the crime of sodomy, a serious accusation that could have led to his execution. Leonardo, 24, was acquitted, but in the aftermath he disappeared for two years. He reemerged to take on a commission at a chapel in Florence in 1478.
4. LEONARDO DISSECTED CORPSES.
For Leonardo, no barrier could be erected between science and art, or between the heart and the mind. His science studies informed his art, and he was particularly interested in human anatomy. In the 1480s, his interest in replicating the sinews and musculature of the body led to his performing numerous dissections of both humans and animals. It's believed that his depictions of the heart, vascular system, genitals, and other components are some of the first illustrations of their type on record.
5. HIS BIGGEST PROJECT—SOMETIMES CALLED "LEONARDO'S HORSE"—WAS DESTROYED.
Leonardo could spend years on a single piece of art—The Last Supper took three—but it was a commission from the Duke of Milan that proved to be his most substantial work-for-hire project. Asked to create a 20-foot-plus statue of the Duke's father on horseback (though the human elements seems to have quickly disappeared), Leonardo toiled for nearly 17 years on the plans and model. Before it could be completed [PDF], French forces invaded Milan in 1499 and shot the clay sculpture, shattering it into pieces.
6. LEONARDO LIKED TO WRITE IN REVERSE.
The hundreds of notebook pages belonging to Leonardo that have survived time reveal a curious habit of the artist: He wrote in mirror script, reversing his handwriting so it would only be readable if the page was held up to a mirror. Despite some suspicion that he was trying to be secretive, the truth is that, as a frequently left-handed writer, he could avoid smearing or erasing the chalk by writing in reverse. (Recent research has confirmed what some have long suspected, though—Leonardo was ambidextrous and would occasionally write with his right hand.)
7. THE LAST SUPPER HAS MIRACULOUSLY SURVIVED.
Leonardo's depiction of Jesus and his apostles just after Jesus proclaimed "one of you will betray me" might be his best-known work outside of Mona Lisa. It was famous in its time, too, with Europeans fascinated by the composition and often trying to replicate it in other mediums. That it's still on display at Milan's Convent of Santa Maria delle Grazie is something of a miracle. When France invaded Milan in 1499, there was discussion of King Louis XII cutting it down from the wall so he could bring it home with him. In 1796, more French soldiers placed it under duress, hurling rocks at it. And in 1943, when Allied forces bombed the area, caretakers of the church had reinforced the painting wall in the hopes it would be enough to keep it safe. The church was severely damaged, but The Last Supper was unharmed.
8. LEONARDO NEVER FINISHED THE MONA LISA.
Although Leonardo was prolific, he was never in any particular hurry to finish individual projects. Many paintings and other works were abandoned or deemed incomplete, including one of his most famous projects, Mona Lisa. When Leonardo died in 1519, the painting (and others) seem to have wound up with his assistant and close friend, Salaì. Some art historians have speculated that a debilitating illness could have resulted in right-side paralysis that would have hampered his work in the last few years of his life.
9. LEONARDO WAS AN ANIMAL RIGHTS ACTIVIST.
Pre-dating the animal rights movement by centuries, Leonardo wrote of his love and respect for animals and often questioned whether humans truly were their superiors. Leonardo reportedly bought caged birds in order to set them free and abstained from eating meat.
10. BILL GATES BOUGHT HIS NOTEBOOK FOR $30.8 MILLION.
Even Leonardo's doodles captured the amazement and attention of the public. In 1994, one of the artist's notebooks went up for auction at Christie's. Titled The Codex Leicester (sometimes Hammer), it was compiled circa 1506 to 1510 while Leonardo was in both Florence and Milan and contains musings on everything from the origins of fossils to why the sky appears blue; another casual note predicts the invention of the submarine. Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates was the winning bidder, paying $30.8 million for the 72-page collection.
11. LEONARDO SUPPOSEDLY INSPIRED PAINT-BY-NUMBERS.
There is some irony in the idea that history's most eclectic artist might have been the inspiration behind the paint-by-numbers kits popularized in the 1950s. A paint company employee named Dan Robbins remembered reading that Leonardo would teach his apprentices to paint using number-sorted canvases (though whether Leonardo actually used this technique is up for debate). By 1954, Robbins's paint-by-numbers kits were doing $20 million in sales.
12. HE HAD BEEF WITH MICHELANGELO.
Portrait of Leonardo Da Vinci, circa 1515.HULTON ARCHIVE/GETTY IMAGES
The celebrated artist and sculptor was Leonardo's contemporary, but the two did not go out for drinks. Historical accounts describe the men as artistic rivals, needling one another about their methods. Michelangelo taunted Leonardo over his inability to complete certain works (apparently, chiefly the horse); Leonardo took his foe to task for over-exaggerated musculature in his sculptures.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fkd6mr1QCBI
Images:
1. Leonardo da Vinci's water wheel
2. Leonardo da Vinci creative process Invention begins with abstract thinking
3. Leonardo da Vinci creative process An invention in its early stages
4. Leonardo da Vinci Detailed anatomical studies
Background from {[https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/502202/12-masterful-facts-about-leonardo-da-vinci]}
12 Masterful Facts About Leonardo Da Vinci BY JAKE ROSSEN
JUNE 29, 2017
(UPDATED: MAY 2, 2019)
There are few historical figures in the world with a creative reputation comparable to that of Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519), the celebrated figurehead of the Italian Renaissance. A polymath, Leonardo alternated stunning paintings (The Last Supper, Mona Lisa) with prescient sketches of inventions and engineering theory.
Although his life could fill several books (and has), we've rounded up some of the more compelling facts about Leonardo da Vinci's work.
1. YOU (PROBABLY) SHOULDN'T CALL HIM DA VINCI.
In modern American culture, it's customary to refer to people by their last name—though not always. Dante is a first name, as are Galileo, Michelangelo, and many other Italians from the period are known by first names. But historians have a different problem with Leonardo di Ser Piero da Vinci. You might think that it's obviously Mr. da Vinci—but da Vinci just means "of Vinci," in reference to where he was from, like Geoffrey of Monmouth or Philip of Macedon. Everywhere from great museums (like the Louvre and the Metropolitan Museum of Art) to auction houses and scholars refer to him as Leonardo (many blame The Da Vinci Code for the widespread usage of da Vinci as a last name).
There are other historians, though, arguing people can be overzealous in their quest for linguistic purity. According to journalist and historian Walter Isaacson, the "da Vinci" usage is incorrect, but not that terrible. "During Leonardo's lifetime, Italians increasingly began to regularize and register the use of hereditary surnames," Isaacson wrote in his 2017 biography Leonardo da Vinci. "When Leonardo moved to Milan, his friend the court poet Bernardo Bellincioni referred to him in writing as 'Leonardo Vinci, the Florentine.'"
Dr. Jill Burke of the University of Edinburgh argues that while da Vinci "might not be thought of as a 'proper' surname," it does "seem to be established as some kind of family name during Leonardo's lifetime. His father, after all, is called Ser Piero da Vinci. Contemporary documents use 'Vinci' pretty much as a surname … People don't ever call him just 'da Vinci' in the documents. But they don't call Lorenzo de' Medici just 'Medici' either. It's not a convention to use surnames in this way in the fifteenth century."
But, conventionally, Leonardo wins out.
2. LEONARDO WAS AN ILLEGITIMATE CHILD BORN DURING WHAT SCHOLARS HAVE CALLED A "'GOLDEN AGE' FOR BASTARDS."
Leonardo was born on April 15, 1452 to a fifth-generation notary, Piero, and an unmarried peasant girl named Caterina. In Isaacson's book, he opens with the argument that Leonardo "had the good luck to be born out of wedlock." If he had been a legitimate son, he would have been expected to follow in his father's line of work and become a notary, and "he would have been sent to one of the classical schools in Florence for the aspiring upper-middle classes and rising middle classes, or a university, and he would have been stuffed full of the medieval scholastic learning of the time," Isaacson told the podcast Recode/Decode. Instead, Leonardo was technically unschooled, but he was able to follow his curiosities and learn through experimentation—and he was free to go into any of the creative arts, like poetry, drawing, etc.
Another point Isaacson brings up was that being an illegitimate child did not carry the stigma then that it had in other eras. Leonardo's baptism was a large event, with 10 godparents present. He split his childhood between his parents' homes and his grandfather's, and eventually his father helped him land apprenticeships in Florence. Even ruling families like the Medicis and Borgias had plenty of illegitimate children who held rank and social prominence. No wonder scholars have deemed it a "golden age" for bastards.
3. A SODOMY CHARGE LED TO HIS 2-YEAR DISAPPEARANCE.
The Italy of the Middle Ages was not an era of particularly progressive thinking. After a young Leonardo showcased his aptitude for art early on, he was soon taken in by acclaimed artist Andrea del Verrocchio in Florence. Though a rich life following his creative pursuits seemed imminent, Leonardo's aspirations were temporarily derailed when he and several other young men were charged with the crime of sodomy, a serious accusation that could have led to his execution. Leonardo, 24, was acquitted, but in the aftermath he disappeared for two years. He reemerged to take on a commission at a chapel in Florence in 1478.
4. LEONARDO DISSECTED CORPSES.
For Leonardo, no barrier could be erected between science and art, or between the heart and the mind. His science studies informed his art, and he was particularly interested in human anatomy. In the 1480s, his interest in replicating the sinews and musculature of the body led to his performing numerous dissections of both humans and animals. It's believed that his depictions of the heart, vascular system, genitals, and other components are some of the first illustrations of their type on record.
5. HIS BIGGEST PROJECT—SOMETIMES CALLED "LEONARDO'S HORSE"—WAS DESTROYED.
Leonardo could spend years on a single piece of art—The Last Supper took three—but it was a commission from the Duke of Milan that proved to be his most substantial work-for-hire project. Asked to create a 20-foot-plus statue of the Duke's father on horseback (though the human elements seems to have quickly disappeared), Leonardo toiled for nearly 17 years on the plans and model. Before it could be completed [PDF], French forces invaded Milan in 1499 and shot the clay sculpture, shattering it into pieces.
6. LEONARDO LIKED TO WRITE IN REVERSE.
The hundreds of notebook pages belonging to Leonardo that have survived time reveal a curious habit of the artist: He wrote in mirror script, reversing his handwriting so it would only be readable if the page was held up to a mirror. Despite some suspicion that he was trying to be secretive, the truth is that, as a frequently left-handed writer, he could avoid smearing or erasing the chalk by writing in reverse. (Recent research has confirmed what some have long suspected, though—Leonardo was ambidextrous and would occasionally write with his right hand.)
7. THE LAST SUPPER HAS MIRACULOUSLY SURVIVED.
Leonardo's depiction of Jesus and his apostles just after Jesus proclaimed "one of you will betray me" might be his best-known work outside of Mona Lisa. It was famous in its time, too, with Europeans fascinated by the composition and often trying to replicate it in other mediums. That it's still on display at Milan's Convent of Santa Maria delle Grazie is something of a miracle. When France invaded Milan in 1499, there was discussion of King Louis XII cutting it down from the wall so he could bring it home with him. In 1796, more French soldiers placed it under duress, hurling rocks at it. And in 1943, when Allied forces bombed the area, caretakers of the church had reinforced the painting wall in the hopes it would be enough to keep it safe. The church was severely damaged, but The Last Supper was unharmed.
8. LEONARDO NEVER FINISHED THE MONA LISA.
Although Leonardo was prolific, he was never in any particular hurry to finish individual projects. Many paintings and other works were abandoned or deemed incomplete, including one of his most famous projects, Mona Lisa. When Leonardo died in 1519, the painting (and others) seem to have wound up with his assistant and close friend, Salaì. Some art historians have speculated that a debilitating illness could have resulted in right-side paralysis that would have hampered his work in the last few years of his life.
9. LEONARDO WAS AN ANIMAL RIGHTS ACTIVIST.
Pre-dating the animal rights movement by centuries, Leonardo wrote of his love and respect for animals and often questioned whether humans truly were their superiors. Leonardo reportedly bought caged birds in order to set them free and abstained from eating meat.
10. BILL GATES BOUGHT HIS NOTEBOOK FOR $30.8 MILLION.
Even Leonardo's doodles captured the amazement and attention of the public. In 1994, one of the artist's notebooks went up for auction at Christie's. Titled The Codex Leicester (sometimes Hammer), it was compiled circa 1506 to 1510 while Leonardo was in both Florence and Milan and contains musings on everything from the origins of fossils to why the sky appears blue; another casual note predicts the invention of the submarine. Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates was the winning bidder, paying $30.8 million for the 72-page collection.
11. LEONARDO SUPPOSEDLY INSPIRED PAINT-BY-NUMBERS.
There is some irony in the idea that history's most eclectic artist might have been the inspiration behind the paint-by-numbers kits popularized in the 1950s. A paint company employee named Dan Robbins remembered reading that Leonardo would teach his apprentices to paint using number-sorted canvases (though whether Leonardo actually used this technique is up for debate). By 1954, Robbins's paint-by-numbers kits were doing $20 million in sales.
12. HE HAD BEEF WITH MICHELANGELO.
Portrait of Leonardo Da Vinci, circa 1515.HULTON ARCHIVE/GETTY IMAGES
The celebrated artist and sculptor was Leonardo's contemporary, but the two did not go out for drinks. Historical accounts describe the men as artistic rivals, needling one another about their methods. Michelangelo taunted Leonardo over his inability to complete certain works (apparently, chiefly the horse); Leonardo took his foe to task for over-exaggerated musculature in his sculptures.
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