Leonardo Da Vinci Accomplishments

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Did you know that Leonardo da Vinci took at least four years to paint the Mona Lisa’s lips? Da Vinci was an Italian painter, draftsman, sculptor, architect, and engineer who lived during the Renaissance time period, a time when Europeans were rediscovering the works of the Ancient Greeks and Romans. In French, “Renaissance” means rebirth, for it was the rebirth of classical works in Europe after the Middle Ages. Da Vinci is seen as the ideal “Renaissance person” meaning that he was talented in multitudemulititude fields of study. His contributions to the art world greatly affected his time period, and they continue to affect the modern world. Science greatly interested da Vinci leading him to make advancements that were extremely ahead of his…show more content…
To help paint the body better, da Vinci studied human anatomy. At first, da Vinci only studied the skeleton and muscles. However, he later went into more detail studying individual parts of the body, leading to studying the internal organs. He studied the brain, heart, and lungs, hypothesizing that they were the vital organs that kept the body functioning. Da Vinci recorded all of his findings in his notebooks; represented by drawings (Britannica). His drawings took precedence over words and are considered to be among the most significant achievements of Renaissance science (Britannica School, Britannica). For his illustrations had a connection between natural and abstract representation. Meaning that parts of the body were transparent so that there could be “insight” into the organ. Also, muscles were represented with “strings.” Da Vinci’s studies in human anatomy, and his illustrations represent the basic principles of modern scientific illustration (Britannica). NOTEBOOKS. Da Vinci once wrote, “Nature is the source of all true knowledge. She has her own logic, her own laws, she has no effect without cause nor inventions without necessity.” (notebooks? Or pbs?). Da Vinci was infatuated by nature. He loved animals and would study zoology. One of his treatises, On the Flight of Birds, was considered to be the first “systematic analysis of the principles of flight.” Frequent subjects of observations were cats, gods, and horses. For many of his studies, he would often have to rely on close observation of the animal. Sometimes, he would dissect the animals and compare them with human body parts. For example, he compared the arms of monkeys with the arms of men. He also compared human and horse legs. These comparisons also made da Vinci one of the first people to study comparative anatomy. Since da Vinci would dissect the animals, he made accurate, detailed studies of the animals.
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