Biography of leonardo da vinci
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The painting’s original Italian name — “La Gioconda” — supports the theory, but it’s far from certain. He spent a great deal of time immersing himself in nature, testing scientific laws, dissecting bodies (human and animal) and thinking and writing about his observations.
Da Vinci’s Notebooks
At some point in the early 1490s, da Vinci began filling notebooks related to four broad themes—painting, architecture, mechanics and human anatomy—creating thousands of pages of neatly drawn illustrations and densely penned commentary, some of which (thanks to left-handed “mirror script”) was indecipherable to others.
The notebooks—often referred to as da Vinci’s manuscripts and “codices”—are housed today in museum collections after having been scattered after his death.
After being present at a 1515 meeting between France’s King Francis I and Pope Leo X in Bologna, the new French monarch offered da Vinci the title “Premier Painter and Engineer and Architect to the King.”
Along with Melzi, da Vinci departed for France, never to return. The French Revolution nearly obliterated the church, and its remains were completely demolished in the early 1800s, making it impossible to identify da Vinci’s exact gravesite.
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He was buried nearby in the palace church of Saint-Florentin.He continued work on his scientific studies until his death; his assistant, Melzi, became the principal heir and executor of his estate. One reason is that his interests were so varied that he wasn’t a prolific painter.
His last and perhaps most generous patron, Francis I provided Leonardo with a stipend and manor house near the royal chateau at Amboise.
Although suffering from a paralysis of the right hand, Leonardo (who wrote with his left-handed) was still able to draw and teach. Even as an apprentice, Leonardo demonstrated his great talent. He traveled outside of Florence to survey military construction projects and sketch city plans and topographical maps.
The now-famous sketch represents da Vinci's study of proportion and symmetry, as well as his desire to relate man to the natural world.
The Last Supper
Around 1495, Ludovico Sforza, then the Duke of Milan, commissioned da Vinci to paint “The Last Supper” on the back wall of the dining hall inside the monastery of Milan’s Santa Maria delle Grazie.
However, he continued to collaborate with del Verrocchio for an additional five years.
It is thought that del Verrocchio completed his “Baptism of Christ” around 1475 with the help of his student, who painted part of the background and the young angel holding the robe of Jesus. However, because they weren’t published in the 1500s, da Vinci’s notebooks had little influence on scientific advancement in the Renaissance period.
How Did Leonardo da Vinci Die?
Da Vinci left Italy for good in 1516, when French ruler Francis I generously offered him the title of “Premier Painter and Engineer and Architect to the King,” which afforded him the opportunity to paint and draw at his leisure while living in a country manor house, the Château of Cloux, near Amboise in France.
Although accompanied by Melzi, to whom he would leave his estate, the bitter tone in drafts of some of his correspondence from this period indicates that da Vinci’s final years may not have been very happy ones.
Flying Machine
Always a man ahead of his time, da Vinci appeared to prophesy the future with his sketches of devices that resemble a modern-day bicycle and a type of helicopter.
He designed plans, possibly with noted diplomat Niccolò Machiavelli, to divert the Arno River away from rival Pisa in order to deny its wartime enemy access to the sea.
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Da Vinci’s Study of Anatomy and Science
Da Vinci thought sight was humankind’s most important sense and eyes the most important organ, and he stressed the importance of saper vedere, or “knowing how to see.” He believed in the accumulation of direct knowledge and facts through observation.
“A good painter has two chief objects to paint — man and the intention of his soul,” da Vinci wrote.
Gifted with a curious mind and a brilliant intellect, da Vinci studied the laws of science and nature, which greatly informed his work. Shadow is the diminution of light.
Da Vinci — The Renaissance Man
Biography
The illegitimate son of a 25-year-old notary, Ser Piero, and a peasant girl, Caterina, Leonardo was born on April 15, 1452, in Vinci, Italy, just outside Florence.
He sketched his observations on loose sheets of papers and pads that he tucked inside his belt. Every obstacle yields to effort.
He spent 17 years in Milan, leaving only after Duke Ludovico Sforza's fall from power in 1499. Giuliano de’ Medici, brother of newly installed Pope Leo X and son of his former patron, gave da Vinci a monthly stipend along with a suite of rooms at his residence inside the Vatican. There, he painted a series of portraits that included “La Gioconda,” a 21-by-31-inch work that’s best known today as “Mona Lisa.” Painted between approximately 1503 and 1506, the woman depicted—especially because of her mysterious slight smile—has been the subject of speculation for centuries.
In the past, she was often thought to be Mona Lisa Gherardini, a courtesan, but current scholarship indicates that she was Lisa del Giocondo, wife of Florentine merchant Francisco del Giocondo.