Leonardo Da Vinci, the great Italian renaissance man who changed our views of both art and science in such a way that modern civilizations still adore and admire his work. His accomplishments are unprecedented, a worldly known brilliant polymath whose unquenchable curiosity was equaled only by his powers of invention. There is no doubt that he is perhaps the greatest person in history, the only man to have attempted to know everything there is to know. His influences encompassed the world of arts, science & technology, and even invented new mechanisms that have revolutionized mankind. Astonishing feats of engineering were established 500 years ago, perhaps surpassing that of our modern era. He is a portrait of a genius of extraordinary diversity.
Leonardo was and is best known as an artist, the creator of such masterpieces as the Mona Lisa and The Last Supper, the most well known paintings of all time. His astonishing works of beauty still captivate and inspire people worldwide. His paintings became famous, and only rivaled by Michelangelo’s creation of Adam. When drawing his masterpiece, the Mona Lisa, his dedication and perseverance in achieving perfection caused him 10 years of his life, only to have painted the lips. In 1466, at the age of fourteen, Leonardo was apprenticed to the artist Andrea di Cione, known as Verrocchio. Other famous painters apprenticed there include Domenico Ghirlandaio, Perugino, Botticelli, and Lorenzo di Credi. Leonardo’s earliest known dated work while there is a drawing in pen and ink of the Arno Valley, drawn on August 5th, 1473. He was commissioned to paint the Virgin of the Rocks for the confraternity of the Immaculate Conception, and The Last Supper for the Monastery of Santa Maria delle Grazie. In January 1478, he received his first independent commission, to paint an altarpiece for the Chapel of St Bernard in the Palazzo Vecchio and The adoration of the Magi in March 1481 for the monks of San Donato a Scopeto. On Octover 18, 1503, he spent two years designing and painting a great mural of the Battle of Anghiari, with Michelangelo designing its companion piece, the Battle of Cascina. In both theory and practice, Leonardo’s artistic influence in the 16th and 17th century Europe, notably France, Spain, Flanders, and Germany was immense, as to have dedicated numerous museums and organizations in his honour. To this day only 15 of his paintings have survived, which have inspired and captivated millions world-wide.
Leonardo’s scientific contributions are brilliant and revolutionary for his time. His new views of the universe and nature are very accurate according to modern science, which is without a doubt a staggering feat for a man who had little to go by. His vision of the world is essentially logic rather than mystery. His personal notebook, which was discovered all over Europe in pieces, reveals correct interpretations of the human anatomy, explanations of physical concepts such as inertia, and sketches for various engineering marvels, such as conceptualizations of a helicopter, a tank, concentrated solar power, a calculator, the double hull and outlined a rudimentary theory of plate tectonics. Additionally, there are compositions for paintings, studies of details and drapery, studies of faces and emotions, of animals, babies, dissections, plant studies, rock formation, and even whirl pools. As a child, Leonardo received informal education in Latin, geometry and mathematics but did not show any particular signs of aptitude. Leonardo’s approach to science was an observational one: he tried to understand a phenomenon by describing and depicting it in utmost detail, and did not emphasize experiments or theoretical explanation. In the 1490’s, while studying mathematics under Luca Pacioli, he prepared a series of drawings of regular solids in skeletal form to be engraved as plates for Pacioli’s book De Divina Proportione, published in 1509. A recent and exhaustive analysis of Leonardo as a scientist by Frtjof Capra argues that Leonardo was a fundamentally different kind of scientist from Galileo, Newton, and other scientists who followed him, whom were more of specialized rather than diverse.
During his lifetime, Leonardo was highly valued as an engineer & a gifted inventor. He created mechanisms never thought of that had influenced people of average status to soldiers in the military. One of his famous inventions, still in use today, is an everyday tool – the scissor. He greatly advanced the state of knowledge in the fields of anatomy, civil engineering, optics, and hydrodynamics. After knowing Ludovico il Moro, Duke of Milan, he went on to produce many different projects for him, including the preparation of floats and pageants for special occasions, designs for a dome for Milan Cathedral, and a model for a huge equestrian monument. When Ludovico was overthrown, Leonardo fled Milan for Venice, where he was employed as a military architect and engineer, devising methods to defend the city from naval attack. He devised a system of moveable barricades to protect the city from attack. While in that position, Leonardo went on to create several maps, which were extremely rare at the time and it would have seemed like a new concept, even though only a few handful of people had seen and known how to use a map. When he returned to the Vatican in Rome, he made a mechanical lion which could walk forward, then open its chest to reveal a cluster of lilies, and also designed wings and shoes for walking on water. Da Vinci also invented musical instruments, such as a keyboard instrument with strings, which made sound via a wheel, horsehair strap, and a bow – a lot like a modern violin. His list of inventions rivals that of Thomas Edison, and continued to do so when building hydraulic pumps, reversible crank mechanisms, finned mortal shells, and even the steam cannon. Big leaps in thought were established during this ‘Da Vinci’ era.
Born in Vinci, Florence on April 15 1452, Leonardo di ser Piero Da Vinci, a man born with remarkable talents that some say transcends from God, displayed infinite grace in everything he did and cultivated his genius so brilliantly that all problems he studied were solved with ease. As Giorgio Vasari once stated, “all his actions seem inspired and indeed everything he does clearly comes from God rather than from human skill.” As a painter, sculptor, architect, musician, mathematician, engineer, inventor, anatomist, geologist, cartographer, botanist, and writer, his works and accomplishments speak for themselves, and through extensive research there is no doubt that he is perhaps the greatest man to have ever lived that has influenced people of such broad perspectives. His death on May 2nd, 1519 only marked the beginning of a new era that has forever changed mankind. In 2003, American author Dan Brown based a fiction novel entitled “The Da Vinci Code”, that sold 80 million copies as of 2009, and went on to be produced into a blockbuster movie.
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