Renaissance Painter - Leonardo Da Vinci

Renaissance Painter:

Leonardo da Vinci

Robin Fitzpatrick

His 101

Professor Becker

March 11,2011

The late fourteenth- and fifteenth-century Europe saw a flowering of culture as the art, literature, and philosophy of the Greco-Roman world were rediscovered. Artists strove for perspective and realism in their paintings.

Many Renaissance scholars and artists studied the art and learning from ancient Greece and Rome, attempting to recapture the spirit of those cultures in their philosophies and their works of art and literature. Renaissance leaders began to reject many of the attitudes and ideas of the Middle Ages.1

With a little bit of some background on the Renaissance Era, I decided to write about the famous painter, Leonardo da Vinci.

Leonardo da Vinci was born on April 15th, 1452. He was born to Ser Piero, a notary, and Caterina, a peasant woman. He was raised by his father. At the age of 15 Leonardo had already mastered skills in the fine arts and the young man was sent to Florence to work as an apprentice in the renowned workshop of Andrea del Verrocchio. 3 In 1472, while still working with del Verrocchio, Leonardo Da Vinci was honored as he was accepted into the painter's guild of Florence. That was also the year that he earned the right to work as a painter in his own right.

In 1482, Leonardo Da Vinci moved to Milan where he had been hired by the city's duke, Duke Ludovico Sforza, and had been given the title of "painter and engineer of the duke." He worked as a painter, sculptor, served as an architect, and he aided in the design of fortifications and military conceptions. Leonardo completed at least six works, while he was in Milan the first time, some of which are The Last Supper and The Virgin of the Rocks.

In 1502, Leonardo begins work as senior military architect and general engineer for Cesare Borgia, son of Pope Alexander VI. In 1503, he was commissioned to paint a mural for the council hall in Florence's Palazzo Vecchio, which is to be the Battle of Anghiari, a work that would remain unfinished. He later died on May 2, 1519 in France.

Leonardo performed many roles and undertook many tasks for his court patrons. He performed many of his duties with enthusiasm.2 As well as being a painter, he was also a known architect. All of his buildings are using the roles of proportion. He invented ingenious water clocks and fountains.

Da Vinci's most famous paintings are: The Last Supper, In 1495 Leonardo Da Vinci was commissioned by Ludovico il Moro to paint a wall in the refectory of the Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan. The dining hall that Leonardo was to decorate with his painting was located in the building adjacent to the church. Leonardo was asked to create a portrait of Christ's last supper with his disciples, but more importantly, Leonardo chose to paint the very moment in which Christ announces that among the disciples lies a traitor. Through his brilliant brushwork, Leonardo manages to make the moment come to life with his personification of each of the twelve disciples, demonstrating their personal reactions to the announcement through facial expressions and movement. 3 The Mona Lisa around 1503. It is unclear even to this day who the woman is in the Mona Lisa. It is said that the painting was commissioned by the wealthy silk merchant Francesco del Giocondo and his wife Lisa. The Vitruvian Man: The Proportions of the Human Figure about 1487, the drawing, which is in pen and ink on paper, depicts a male figure in two superimposed positions with his arms and legs apart and simultaneously inscribed in a circle and square.

Leonardo's' paintings have a unique effect on viewers, ultimately caused by his impressive scientific approach toward his work. Most of his paintings were done in oils. He was one of the few artists who mastered the concept of the "vanishing point", which involves creating a remarkable sense of