Leonardo da Vinci

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'Perhaps the most gifted human being who has ever li\ cd' - this is how C. 11. Monk sums up the life and work of Leonardo da A'inci. A man of magnetic charm and great physical beauty, and a ncar-lcgcndary figure from his youth, in his magnificent old age Leonardo was widely credited with supernatural powers: nothing less could explain this colossus of the intellect and the imagination.
As a painter he was, with Michclangclo, Raphael and 'i'itian, one of the supreme artists of the Italian Renaissance. His Miidoniias, his portraits of women and the famous Last Supper brought him early fame and the favours of the great patrons of the age -Mcdici, Sforza, Horgia. Hut while his success in his lifetime and his influence on later painters depend on a handful of paintings, today \vc art-fortunate to be able to browse among his notebooks, virtually unknown until loo years" ago, in which he recorded, in his neat mirror-writing and in thotisands of magnificent drawings, the e.xtraordinary... Tovább

Fülszöveg

'Perhaps the most gifted human being who has ever li\ cd' - this is how C. 11. Monk sums up the life and work of Leonardo da A'inci. A man of magnetic charm and great physical beauty, and a ncar-lcgcndary figure from his youth, in his magnificent old age Leonardo was widely credited with supernatural powers: nothing less could explain this colossus of the intellect and the imagination.
As a painter he was, with Michclangclo, Raphael and 'i'itian, one of the supreme artists of the Italian Renaissance. His Miidoniias, his portraits of women and the famous Last Supper brought him early fame and the favours of the great patrons of the age -Mcdici, Sforza, Horgia. Hut while his success in his lifetime and his influence on later painters depend on a handful of paintings, today \vc art-fortunate to be able to browse among his notebooks, virtually unknown until loo years" ago, in which he recorded, in his neat mirror-writing and in thotisands of magnificent drawings, the e.xtraordinary range of his interests. 1 Icrc we can get a real sense of the man behind the public figure, for the writings arc on every conccivable subject: notes and designs for btiildings and indeed whole towns, theories of optics and astronomy, detailed instructions on the practice of painting, observations on anatomy, plans for mechanical dcviccs of all sorts including flying machines of various kinds, right down to revealing little notes such as jokes, fragments of personal accounts, the draft of a proud letter to Lodox ico Sforza and a rueful memorandum on the problems he was ha\ ing with one of his studio bovs.
'I'he 74 illustrations, 43 in colour, combinc with these extracts and with C. II. Monk's Iticid and sympathetic introduction to round out the picttirc of Leonardo as a unit|uc artist, scientist and thinker the tmix crsal genius. Vissza