Leonardo da Vinci
BIOGRAPHY
Leonardo da Vinci was a Florentine artist, one of the great masters of the High Renaissance, who was also celebrated as a painter, sculptor, architect, engineer, and scientist. His profound love of knowledge and research was the keynote of both his artistic and scientific endeavors. His innovations in the field of painting influenced the course of Italian art for more than a century after his death, and his scientific studies—particularly in the fields of anatomy, optics, and hydraulics—anticipated many of the developments of modern science.
Early Life in Florence
Leonardo was born on April 15, 1452, in
the small Tuscan town of Vinci, near Florence. He was the son of a wealthy
Florentine notary and a peasant woman. In the mid-1460s the family settled in
Florence, where Leonardo was given the best education that Florence, the
intellectual and artistic center of Italy, could offer. He rapidly advanced
socially and intellectually. He was handsome, persuasive in conversation, and a
fine musician and improviser. About 1466 he was apprenticed as a garzone (studio
boy) to Andrea del Verrocchio, the leading Florentine painter and
sculptor of his day. In Verrocchio's workshop Leonardo was introduced to
many activities, from the painting of altarpieces and panel pictures to the
creation of large sculptural projects in marble and bronze. In 1472 he was
entered in the painter's guild of Florence, and in 1476 he is still mentioned as
Verrocchio's assistant. In Verrocchio's Baptism of Christ
(circa 1470, Uffizi, Florence), the kneeling angel at the left of the painting
is by Leonardo. In 1478 Leonardo became an independent master. His first
commission, to paint an altarpiece for the chapel of the Palazzo Vecchio, the
Florentine town hall, was never executed. His first large painting, The Adoration
of the Magi (begun 1481, Uffizi), left unfinished, was ordered in 1481 for
the Monastery of San Donato a Scopeto, Florence. Other works ascribed to his
youth are the so-called Benois Madonna (c. 1478, Hermitage, Saint Petersburg),
the portrait Ginerva de' Benci (c. 1474, National Gallery, Washington,
D.C.), and the unfinished Saint Jerome (c. 1481, Pinacoteca, Vatican).
Years in Milan
About 1482 Leonardo entered the service
of the duke of Milan, Ludovico Sforza, having written the duke an astonishing
letter in which he stated that he could build portable bridges; that he knew the
techniques of constructing bombardments and of making cannons; that he could
build ships as well as armored vehicles, catapults, and other war machines; and
that he could execute sculpture in marble, bronze, and clay. He served as
principal engineer in the duke's numerous military enterprises and was active
also as an architect. In addition, he assisted the Italian mathematician Luca
Pacioli in the celebrated work Divina Proportione (1509). Evidence indicates
that Leonardo had apprentices and pupils in Milan, for whom he probably wrote
the various texts later compiled as Treatise on Painting (1651; trans. 1956).
The most important of his own paintings during the early Milan period was The
Virgin of the Rocks, two versions of which exist (1483-85, Louvre,
Paris; 1490s to 1506-08, National Gallery, London); he worked on the
compositions for a long time, as was his custom, seemingly unwilling to finish
what he had begun. From 1495 to 1497 Leonardo labored on his masterpiece, The Last
Supper, a mural in the refectory of the Monastery of Santa Maria delle
Grazie, Milan. Unfortunately, his experimental use of oil on dry plaster (on
what was the thin outer wall of a space designed for serving food) was
technically unsound, and by 1500 its deterioration had begun. Since 1726
attempts have been made, unsuccessfully, to restore it; a concerted restoration
and conservation program, making use of the latest technology, was begun in 1977
and is reversing some of the damage. Although much of the original surface is
gone, the majesty of the composition and the penetrating characterization of the
figures give a fleeting vision of its vanished splendor. During his long stay in
Milan, Leonardo also produced other paintings and drawings (most of which have
been lost), theater designs, architectural drawings, and models for the dome of
Milan Cathedral. His largest commission was for a colossal bronze monument to
Francesco Sforza, father of Ludovico, in the courtyard of Castello Sforzesco. In
December 1499, however, the Sforza family was driven from Milan by French
forces; Leonardo left the statue unfinished (it was destroyed by French archers,
who used it as a target) and he returned to Florence in 1500.
Return to Florence
In 1502 Leonardo entered the service of
Cesare Borgia, duke of Romagna and son and chief general of Pope Alexander
VI;
in his capacity as the duke's chief architect and engineer, Leonardo supervised
work on the fortresses of the papal territories in central Italy. In 1503 he was
a member of a commission of artists who were to decide on the proper location
for the David (1501-04, Accademia, Florence), the famous colossal marble
statue by the Italian sculptor Michelangelo, and he also served as an
engineer in the war against Pisa. Toward the end of the year Leonardo began to
design a decoration for the great hall of the Palazzo Vecchio. The subject was
the Battle of Anghiari, a Florentine victory in its war with Pisa. He made many
drawings for it and completed a full-size cartoon, or sketch, in 1505, but he
never finished the wall painting. The cartoon itself was destroyed in the 17th
century, and the composition survives only in copies, of which the most famous
is the one by the Flemish painter Peter Paul
Rubens (c. 1615, Louvre).
During this second Florentine period, Leonardo painted several portraits, but
the only one that survives is the famous Mona Lisa (1503-06, Louvre). One
of the most celebrated portraits ever painted, it is also known as La Gioconda,
after the presumed name of the woman's husband. Leonardo seems to have had a
special affection for the picture, for he took it with him on all of his
subsequent travels.
Later Travels and Death
In 1506 Leonardo went again to Milan, at
the summons of its French governor, Charles d'Amboise. The following year he was
named court painter to King Louis XII of France, who was then residing in Milan.
For the next six years Leonardo divided his time between Milan and Florence,
where he often visited his half brothers and half sisters and looked after his
inheritance. In Milan he continued his engineering projects and worked on an
equestrian figure for a monument to Gian Giacomo Trivulzio, commander of the
French forces in the city; although the project was not completed, drawings and
studies have been preserved. From 1514 to 1516 Leonardo lived in Rome under the
patronage of Pope Leo X: he was housed in the Palazzo Belvedere in the Vatican
and seems to have been occupied principally with scientific experimentation. In
1516 he traveled to France to enter the service of King Francis I. He spent his
last years at the Château de Cloux (later called Clos-Lucé), near the King's
summer palace at Amboise on the Loire, where he died on May 2, 1519.
Paintings
Although Leonardo produced a relatively
small number of paintings, many of which remained unfinished, he was
nevertheless an extraordinarily innovative and influential artist. During his
early years, his style closely paralleled that of Verrocchio, but he
gradually moved away from his teacher's stiff, tight, and somewhat rigid
treatment of figures to develop a more evocative and atmospheric handling of
composition. The early The Adoration of the Magi introduced a new
approach to composition, in which the main figures are grouped in the
foreground, while the background consists of distant views of imaginary ruins
and battle scenes. Leonardo's stylistic innovations are even more apparent in
The Last Supper, in which he re-created a traditional theme in an entirely
new way. Instead of showing the 12 apostles as individual figures, he grouped
them in dynamic compositional units of three, framing the figure of Christ, who
is isolated in the center of the picture. Seated before a pale distant landscape
seen through a rectangular opening in the wall, Christ—who is about to
announce that one of those present will betray him—represents a calm nucleus
while the others respond with animated gestures. In the monumentality of the
scene and the weightiness of the figures, Leonardo reintroduced a style
pioneered more than a generation earlier by Masaccio, the father of
Florentine painting. The Mona Lisa, Leonardo's most famous work, is as
well known for its mastery of technical innovations as for the mysteriousness of
its legendary smiling subject. This work is a consummate example of two
techniques—sfumato and chiaroscuro—of which Leonardo was one of the first
great masters. Sfumato is characterized by subtle, almost infinitesimal
transitions between color areas, creating a delicately atmospheric haze or smoky
effect; it is especially evident in the delicate gauzy robes worn by the sitter
and in her enigmatic smile. Chiaroscuro is the technique of modeling and
defining forms through contrasts of light and shadow; the sensitive hands of the
sitter are portrayed with a luminous modulation of light and shade, while color
contrast is used only sparingly. An especially notable characteristic of
Leonardo's paintings is his landscape backgrounds, into which he was among the
first to introduce atmospheric perspective. The chief masters of the High
Renaissance in Florence, including Raphael, Andrea del Sarto, and
Fra Bartolommeo, all learned from Leonardo; he completely transformed the school
of Milan; and at Parma, Correggio's artistic development was given
direction by Leonardo's work. Leonardo's many extant drawings, which
reveal his brilliant draftsmanship and his mastery of the anatomy of humans,
animals, and plant life, may be found in the principal European collections; the
largest group is at Windsor Castle in England. Probably his most famous drawing
is the magnificent Self-Portrait (c. 1510-13, Biblioteca Reale, Turin).
Sculptural and Architectural Drawings
Because none of Leonardo's sculptural
projects was brought to completion, his approach to three-dimensional art can
only be judged from his drawings. The same strictures apply to his architecture;
none of his building projects was actually carried out as he devised them. In
his architectural drawings, however, he demonstrates mastery in the use of
massive forms, a clarity of expression, and especially a deep understanding of
ancient Roman sources.
Scientific and Theoretical Projects
As a scientist Leonardo towered above all
his contemporaries. His scientific theories, like his artistic innovations, were
based on careful observation and precise documentation. He understood, better
than anyone of his century or the next, the importance of precise scientific
observation. Unfortunately, just as he frequently failed to bring to conclusion
artistic projects, he never completed his planned treatises on a variety of
scientific subjects. His theories are contained in numerous notebooks, most of
which were written in mirror script. Because they were not easily decipherable,
Leonardo's findings were not disseminated in his own lifetime; had they been
published, they would have revolutionized the science of the 16th century.
Leonardo actually anticipated many discoveries of modern times. In anatomy he
studied the circulation of the blood and the action of the eye. He made
discoveries in meteorology and geology, learned the effect of the moon on the
tides, foreshadowed modern conceptions of continent formation, and surmised the
nature of fossil shells. He was among the originators of the science of
hydraulics and probably devised the hydrometer; his scheme for the canalization
of rivers still has practical value. He invented a large number of ingenious
machines, many potentially useful, among them an underwater diving suit. His
flying devices, although not practicable, embodied sound principles of
aerodynamics. A creator in all branches of art, a discoverer in most branches of
science, and an inventor in branches of technology, Leonardo deserves, perhaps
more than anyone, the title of Homo Universalis, Universal Man.
Type of Work: Painting,
Sculpture, Architecture, Inventions
Nationality:
Italian
Style/Movement: Renaissance
Best Known For: Living
well before his time.
Important Works:
Bio:
Leonardo da Vinci was, as you are probably aware, a true master artist. In fact, many folks refer to him as the greatest artist ever produced by the Renaissance. The man who grew to a ripe old age of 67, is probably best known for his mysterious painting, "Mona Lisa" or "La Gioconda", a portrait of the wife of a Florentine official which was painted in da Vinci's later years.
As a painter, da Vinci was astounding, having trained under the watchful eye of Verrocchio, a Florentine painter, goldsmith and sculptor. da Vinci learned his craft and went on to use it not only for pleasure, but for payment. His reputation as a master earned him many commissions. He was the original creative thinker, a philosopher as much as an artist who after contemplating a move in his work, would stop, look and contemplate some more.
A painter, sculptor, scientist, inventor, architect, mathematician and philosopher, Leonardo da Vinci influenced generations of humans.