Term paper on Leonardo Da Vinci
Leonardo Da Vinci Essays
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Leonardo da Vinci was born in the year 1452 in the small hill town of Vinci. His father was a successful notary and his mother a peasant woman. The
little town of Vinci has changed very little in 544 years since then. Stone
houses are clustered together around the protective battlements of a castle.
The tall church bell tower is still an important landmark which can be seen
for miles. Vinci is surrounded by fertile farmland. The hillsides are planted
with grape vines and fruit trees and patches of silvery green olive trees dot
the landscape. The slopes above Vinci lead to Mount Albano, a high peak
where Leonardo later hiked and made observations about the atmosphere.
Small mountain streams run down from the mountain past Vinci to the valley
of the Arno River below. For a curious boy who loved nature, the area
around Vinci must have been a wonderful childhood home. Leonardo was
free to explore the woods and streams and to study the insects, animals, and
birds which he later sketched in great detail in his notebooks. Leonardo's
early fascination with nature clearly inspired the paintings he would create as
an adult. The detailed and lifelike plants and wildflowers that he painted at
the feet of the angel in The Annunciation and the rocky caves and pools of
water surrounding the figures in The Virgin of the Rocks were created from
observations and sketches he began making as a child in Vinci.
When he was about 12 years old, Leonardo moved to the bustling city
of Florence with his father. Because young Leonardo demonstrated a great
talent for drawing, his father later made him an apprentice in the studio of
Andrea del Verrocchio, a leading artist in Florence. In Verrocchio's studio
Leonardo learned the painters craft of preparing canvases, making brushes,
and grinding and mixing paints. Verrocchio also taught him to sculpt in
wood, stone and clay, and how to cast metal objects in silver and gold.
Artists in the fifteenth century Italy were more than just expert painters and
sculptors however. Verrocchio was hired by wealthy patrons to create
furniture, musical instruments, navigational compasses, and bronze bells for
cathedrals among other things. Leonardo watched carefully and learned every
craft that went on in the workshop. He drew constantly to record what he
observed. When he wasn't needed in the studio, Leonardo explored the city of
Florence. He observed and sketched everything that interested him. He
visited the building site for the great cathedral being constructed in Florence
and made careful drawings of the machinery he saw at work there.
By the age of 21 Leonardo was a skilled painter, Verrocchio permitted
him to help with an important painting of the Baptism of Christ. Leonardo
painted the kneeling angel and some of the background for this work. The
face of Leonardo's angel is delicately colored and shows Leonardo's talent at
representing emotions. Legend has it that when Verrocchio first saw
Leonardo's angel he was so impressed by Leonardo's abilities that "he
(Verrocchio) never wanted to touch colors again." The hazy features of the
background Leonardo painted for the Baptism of Christ show he had already
begun to develop his sense of aerial perspective. After he finished his
apprenticeship, Leonardo began work for the ruler of Florence, Lorenzo de
Medici. He was supposed to paint an Adoration of the Magi for a church
altar, but he never completed it, and in 1483 he moved to Milan. After 17
years in Milan he returned several times to Florence, where he worked on
many different projects. By 1503 Florence was at war with the neighboring
city of Pisa, and Leonardo worked on a plan to divert the Arno River from
the enemy city. First it would cut off Pisa's supply route, and later the river
would be turned into a canal for peacetime use. Neither project was ever
finished, though Leonardo's reputation as a creative and talented engineer
was firmly established.
After the war with Pisa, Leonardo again took up painting. He
completed his most famous portrait La Gioconda (Mona Lisa). He also wrote
about and sketched the flight of birds and experimented with different
designs for human powered flying machines. He was also commissioned to
paint a huge mural commemorating a Florentine victory in the Battle of
Anghiari. Leonardo completed a full-size cartoon of the battle illustrating the
horrors of war as he had seen them while in Borgia's service. But he never
finished the war painting, and in 1506 he was glad to leave Florence to go
work in Milan.
From 1514 to 1516 Leonardo lived in Rome and worked under the
patronage of Prince Giuliano the Magnificent, brother of Pope Leo X.
Giuliano was fascinated by mechanical devices and Leonardo built many toys
and machines to amuse him. Among them was a machine to turn copper
metal into strips of uniform size. He also completed another great painting of
John the Baptist as a young man. Leonardo had wished to keep studying
human anatomy, but the Church would not allow him to examine and cut up
dead bodies. Instead he studied animal parts obtained from a butcher's shop.
From these he produced brilliant models of how the heart works. In...
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