Visual Arts Paper Essay Example
Leonardo Da Vinci and the Renaissance
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ART/100
March 5, 2012
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Leonardo Da Vinci and the Renaissance The Renaissance time period started around the middle 1400s and ended in the early 1600s. This time period was traditionally viewed as a bridge between the Middle Ages and the Modern era. The Renaissance is best known for its artistic developments and the contributions from a polymathic person by the name of Leonardo Da Vinci. Leonardo Da Vinci was the ultimate Renaissance man. He was an inventor, a scientist, and an artist that influenced the Renaissance period. According to "Leonardo's perspective" (1997), "During the Renaissance, European artists began to study the model of nature more closely and to paint with the goal of greater realism. They learned to create lifelike people and animals, and they became skilled at creating the illusion of depth and distance on flats walls and canvases by using the techniques of linear perspective.” (para. 1) At the age of fourteen, Leonardo Da Vinci served as an apprentice to famous artist Verrocchio. Verrocchio’s workshop exposed Da Vinci to machines and the workings of those machines. Da Vinci observed and used a variety of machines. By studying them he gained practical knowledge about their design and structure (Inventor's workshop, 1997). In his sketchbooks, researchers have found drawings resembling parachutes, war tanks, helicopters, scuba tanks, water lifting devices, crossbows and retractable landing gear for planes, and probably more. His many talents in drawing gave him mechanical ideas with clarity. Five hundred years after they were put on paper, many of his sketches can easily be used as blueprints to create perfect working models (Inventor's workshop, 1997). Two of the most famous paintings were created by Leonardo Da Vinci: The Mona Lisa and The Last Supper. Looking at The Mona Lisa, Da Vinci sketched his work to get the muscles, anatomy and the expressions
XXXXXXXX
ART/100
March 5, 2012
XXXXXXX
Leonardo Da Vinci and the Renaissance The Renaissance time period started around the middle 1400s and ended in the early 1600s. This time period was traditionally viewed as a bridge between the Middle Ages and the Modern era. The Renaissance is best known for its artistic developments and the contributions from a polymathic person by the name of Leonardo Da Vinci. Leonardo Da Vinci was the ultimate Renaissance man. He was an inventor, a scientist, and an artist that influenced the Renaissance period. According to "Leonardo's perspective" (1997), "During the Renaissance, European artists began to study the model of nature more closely and to paint with the goal of greater realism. They learned to create lifelike people and animals, and they became skilled at creating the illusion of depth and distance on flats walls and canvases by using the techniques of linear perspective.” (para. 1) At the age of fourteen, Leonardo Da Vinci served as an apprentice to famous artist Verrocchio. Verrocchio’s workshop exposed Da Vinci to machines and the workings of those machines. Da Vinci observed and used a variety of machines. By studying them he gained practical knowledge about their design and structure (Inventor's workshop, 1997). In his sketchbooks, researchers have found drawings resembling parachutes, war tanks, helicopters, scuba tanks, water lifting devices, crossbows and retractable landing gear for planes, and probably more. His many talents in drawing gave him mechanical ideas with clarity. Five hundred years after they were put on paper, many of his sketches can easily be used as blueprints to create perfect working models (Inventor's workshop, 1997). Two of the most famous paintings were created by Leonardo Da Vinci: The Mona Lisa and The Last Supper. Looking at The Mona Lisa, Da Vinci sketched his work to get the muscles, anatomy and the expressions