Great Scientists: da Vinci
Leonardo da Vinci is the most outstanding figure of the Italian Renaissance. He is an example of a ‘universal man’ who possessed multiple talents: he was not only a great representative of art as an artist, a sculptor, a musician, a writer, but also a great architect, technician, engineer and inventor.
Leonardo was born not far from Florence to the family of a notary public. His father hoped that Leonardo would follow his steps, but social life wasn’t interesting for the son.
Having moved to Florence, Leonardo became an apprentice of the artist Andrea di Cione (known as Verrocchio). An artistic activity at that time in Florence implied technical experiments. Da Vinci got acquainted with Toscanelli, an astronomer, which resulted in Leonardo’s interest in different fields of science.
Da Vinci’s first artistic work dates back to 1473. A few years later he founded his own studio. He manifested himself as an ingenious and an indigenous artist, and his further works only contributed to his fame.
In the 80s da Vinci started working on different projects as an engineer. He predicted a great number of inventions, that appeared in the 19th and 20th centuries only. He carried out an experiment on flying machines, but the materials of his time were far from being perfect, and this fact didn’t let him implement his ideas, but the models he created were efficient, and his calculations were precise enough to be working.
‘Mona Lisa’ is Leonardo’s most famous work. A lot of rumours have been spread since the time he created it, but we can’t deny its strong emotional impact on the spectator. People are even said to faint when examining it closely.
His last years are closely connected with France. He was invited there in 1516 to take the position of a royal artist, an architect and an engineer.
But he fell ill soon, his right hand grew numb and he died in 1519 in Amboise and was buried there.
He left a lot of drawings which are studied by famous scientists today. Quite a lot of things haven’t been deciphered yet. Leonardo da Vinci can be considered one of the most mysterious and outstanding people in the history of humankind, and it’ll take us a long time to reveal his secrets and come to understanding them to their full extent.
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