LEONARDO DA VINCI

(1452-1519)

HISTORICAL BACKGROUND THE RENAISSANCE

The Renaissance was a cultural movement that took place between the 14th to the 17th century. It began in Flonrence and then it spread to the rest of Europe. This period was characterized by the humanism. It was an intelectual and philosophic momevent that started in Florence, Rome and Venice.

HISTORICAL BACKGROUND THE CINQUENCENTO

It was a period of the European art, in the 16th century, which started in Rome. It was the second phase of the Reinassance and it was preceded by the Quattrocento and followed by the Seicento. It was also called High Renaissance and took place between the years 1450 and 1527.

LITERARY AND MUSICAL BACKGROUND

Literature
The most famous writters were: Dante, Divina Commedia. Boccaccio, Decameron. Petrarch, Canzoniere. Baldassare Castiglione. Niccol Machiavelli

Musical
Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina was a musicians model in Council of Trent. As the Renaissance era closes a new tipe of music was written, the madrigal. The most important composers were: Gesualdo. Luzzaschi Marenzio.

ART BACKGROUND
Artists began to use the tone contrast, and the sfumato and chiaroscuro were developed by Leonardo da Vinci and Giorgione. These were the new techniques in the manipulation of light and darkness that were developed during the begining of the 16th century, especially in the Northern part of Italy.
In this period, artists began to represent non-religious themes.

ART BACKGROUND
The most famous painters from the High Renaissance are Leonardo da Vinci (The Last Supper), Raphael (The School of Athens, and Michelangelo Buonarroti (Sistine Chapel celing). Mannerist artists, who rebelled against the principles of High Renaissance, tried to represent figures in illogical spaces.

ART BACKGROUND
ARCHITECTURE
Filippo Brunelleschi (Florence Baptistry) Arnolfo di Cambio (Florence Cathedrals dome) Michelozzo Michelozzi (Palazzo Rucellai and Basilica of Santa Mara Novella). He also was the author of a book called: De re Aedificatoria

LEONARDO DA VINCI BIOGRAPHY

Leonardo Da Vinci was born on the 15 of April of 1452 in the small Tuscan town of Vinci, near Florence. His father was a wealthy man and his mother was a peasant. His father got married four times. Leonardo da Vinci was a very important Florentine artist, who was also celebrated as a painter, sculptor, architect, engineer, and scientist. He innovated in the field of painting and it influenced the 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.

LEONARDO DA VINCI BIOGRAPHY

He had an excellent education and he early knew he wanted to be a humanist man. About 1466, when he was 14, he was taught by Andrea del Verrocchio, the leading Florentine painter and sculptor of his day. With Verrocchio, Leonardo got the chance to learn about drafting, chemistry, metallurgy, leather working, plaster casting, metal working, mechanics, carpentry, drawing, painting, sculpting and modelling.

LEONARDO DA VINCI BIOGRAPHY

During his youth a new painting technique came from the Netherlands, the oil. With that new technique he become a better painter than his master. His best paintings of this time are San Jeronimo and the Adoration of the Magi. In 1472, at the age of twenty, Leonardo was named master by the Guild os St Luke, the guild of artists and doctors of medicine, and he moved to his own workshop.

LEONARDO DA VINCI BIOGRAPHY

When Leonardo went to Milan, at 1482, one of his friends told him his great potential in music, so he created a silver lyre in the shape of a horses head. At this time he painted the Virgin of the Rocks and the Last Supper. When the Second Italian War began, Leonardo and his assistant and friend Luca Pacioli moved to Venice, where he was employed as a military architect and engineer.

LEONARDO DA VINCI BIOGRAPHY

When he came back to Florence, in 1500, he painted The Virgin and the Child with St. John the Baptist. In 1505 he returned to Milan, where many pupils worked with him. From 1513 to 1516, Leonardo spent much of his time living in the Belvedere in the Vatican, in Rome. He mainteined his personal life in secret and nowadays the people talk about his possible homosexuality. He died at Clos Luc, on May 2, 1519

LEONARDOS INVENTIONS
His
most famous invention is the Vitruvian man. It was a perfect design of the human body based on Vitruvius proportions (an ancient roman architect). He also invented a revolutionary car made of wood that would propel itself with the help of some springs and gearwheels.

LEONARDOS INVENTIONS
He invented a flying machine that was equipped with seats and controls for the pilot. It also had flapped wings. He made a kind of helicopter. It was designed for being operated by four people, although that, it never flew. He did a span 720-foot bridge, for retreates in wars.

LEONARDOS STUDIES
He also studied anatomy, he drew many studies of the human skeleton, the heart and vascular system, the sex organs, and other internal organs. He made the first draw of a fetus in the uterus. He also dissect human corpses at the Hospital of Santa Maria Nuova.

LEONARDOS INVENTIONS
Because he loved the sea he did many drawings of a dive equipment. The suit was made up leather and among other things it included a bag for urinate in it. In that period of time the black death asolated Europe so he designed a model of a city that would have ventilation systems.

PAINTINGS
His most famous paintings are:

Annunciation (1475)

23 years

Ginebra de Venci (1476) 24 years

Madona Benois (1478) 26 years

The Adoration of the Magi (1481) 29 years

St Jeronimo (1482) 30 years

Portrait of a musician (1485) 33 years

The Last Supper (1498) 46 years

Lady with an Ermine (1484) 32 years

Gioconda (1502)

50 years

The Virgin of the Rocks (1483-86) 31-34 years

BIBLIOGRAPHY
http://www.astroseti.org/vernew.php?codigo=2535
http://www.epdlp.com/pintor.php?id=402 http://www.biografiasyvidas.com/monografia/leonardo/ http://www.redesc.ilce.edu.mx/redescolar/publicaciones/publi_qu epaso/leonardo_da_vinci.htm

http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renacimiento

http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinquecento