LEONARDO DA VINCI
Universal Genius
(Born on 14th April 1452-1519)
orn on 14th April 1452, outside the village vinci near Florence in central Italy, Leonardo da Vinci was one of the greatest painters and most versatile geniuses in History. He was one of the key figures of the Renaissance, a great cultural movement that had begun in Italy in the 1300s. His portrait ‘Mona Lisa’ and his religious scene ‘The Last Supper’ rank among the most famous pictures ever painted.
His scientific work includes accurate drawings of human anatomy. Leonardo, as he is almost always called, was trained to be a painter. But his interests and achievements spread into an astonishing variety of fields that are now considered scientific specialisms. Leonardo studied anatomy, botany, geology, geometry and optics and he designed machines and drew plans for hundreds of inventions.
Because Leonardo excelled in such an amazing number of areas of human knowledge, he is often called a ‘Universal Genius’. He had little interest in Literature, history or religion. He formulated a few scientific laws but never developed his ideas systematically. Leonardo was most of all an excellent observer. He concerned himself with what the eye could see, rather than with purely abstract concepts.
FAMOUS PAINTINGS
Mona Lisa
The Last Supper
Leonardo da Vinci was one of the greatest painters and most versatile geniuses in History. Recently, 14th April was his birthday. He made the famous painting of Mona Lisa and The Last Supper. Well, last sunday, I was watching ‘The Judas Gospel’ and ‘The Bible Week’ on National Geography & History channel on the Television. It was interesting to listen to the interview of Dan Brown (Da Vinci Code) and what struck me was the picture of The Last Supper.
Here, in this pic you see John on right of Jesus – A ‘V’ Shape and it is said Leonardo Da Vinci has secretly tried to leave some message here and he knew many things that the world did not know about Jesus. It was argued in the programme that it isn’t John but it was a feminine figure Mary Magdalene, who is said to be the wife of Jesus.
Well, Leonardo began working on it in 1495, and finished The Last Supper in 1498. Leonardo was a known procrastinator with a marked tendency to leave projects unfinished. The Last Supper is Leonardo’s visual interpretation of an event chronicled in all four of the Gospels (books in the Christian New Testament). The evening before Christ was betrayed by one of his disciples, he gathered them together to eat, tell them he knew what was coming and wash their feet (a gesture symbolizing that all were equal under the eyes of the Lord). As they ate and drank together, Christ gave the disciples explicit instructions on how to eat and drink in the future, in remembrance of him. It was the first celebration of the Eucharist, a ritual still performed. Christ revealed that one disciple would betray and all twelve who sat there reacted to the news with different degrees of horror, anger and shock.
Do you know who were they? Hmm…they were Bartholomew, James Minor, Andrew, Judas, Peter, John, Christ, Thomas, James Major, Phillip, Matthew, Thaddeus, Simon.
Btw, what does INRI stand for? Does it mean ‘Jesus of Nazareth? I guess so. Check the Christ Resurrection page here and profile of Leonardo Da Vinci.
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