LEONARDO DA VINCI & MICHELANGELO The Renaissance

Leonardo da Vinci  As a young man, Leonardo da Vinci applied for a job with the ruling duke of Milan.  He wrote, “I have plans for bridges, very light and strong and suitable for carrying very easily. When a place is besieged I know how to cut off water from the trenches and how to construct… scaling ladders and other instruments.” He went on to describe his plans for destroying fortresses, constructing various “engines” for attack and defense, and making cannons and armored cars.

Jack-of-all Trades  Leonardo was a great engineer, but he was also one of the foremost artists of the age, indeed of any age.  He was a Jack-of-all trades, a sculptor, a painter, a designer, and a scientist. Most of all, he was a visionary.  He was most known for his…  Paintings  Sculptures  inventions

An Apprentice  Born in 1452 near the village of Vinci, about 60 miles of Florence.  At age 15, his father took him to a famous artists and asked him to make Leonardo his apprentice.  Apprentice – someone who agreed to live with and work for another for a specified period, in return for instruction in a trade or craft.  About five years after he began his apprenticeship, Leonardo established his own workshop in Florence.  Great works – many incomplete

Spectacularly Talented  Story: He was assigned to paint an angel in one of his master’s commissioned paintings. When the master saw what he had pained, he found it so beautiful he knew that he could never equal it. The master then gave up painting to concentrate on sculpture.

Working for the Duke of Milan  He was about 30 yrs old when he sent his resume to the duke of Milan and was hired for the job.  During his 17-year stay in Milan, Leonardo completed some of his greatest work.

The Last Supper  The duke asked Leonardo to paint a picture of the Last Supper. This took him 3 years to complete. It was said that the prior complained that the artist was taking too much time.  Prior: the person, or officer, in charge of a priory, or monastery

Beyond Milan  In 1500, Leonardo returned to Florence.  During this period he completed his other most famous painting and perhaps the most famous portrait in the world, the Mona Lisa. His use of light and shade have been admired by many.

A True Renaissance Man  Leonardo left behind few finished works of art: only about a dozen paintings and not one complete sculpture. He did leave many detailed and highly accurate drawings of human anatomy and of various mechanical devices. And he left more than 5,000 pages from his notebooks.  No one was more able to imagine what could be than Leonardo. He was in many ways the embodiment of the Renaissance, a true Renaissance man, devoted to knowledge and beauty in all its forms and expressions.  Renaissance man: one who is highly skilled and has broad interests in many or all of the arts and sciences.

Unfinished Works

Michelangelo’s Greatest Work  Michelangelo’s Greatest Work was the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.  The ceiling was 5,000 square feet  He painted it with scenes from the Old Testament.  It took him 4 years to complete.  His patron was not happy with how long it was taking, so one day he whacked Michelangelo with a cane and threatened to throw him off the scaffold if he did not speed up his work.

The Sistine Chapel

Problems While Painting the Sistine Chapel  Difficult conditions  Shut up in a huge room all day for 4 years  His back and neck ached.  His eyes were so used to focusing on a ceiling several feet away that he could not read a letter unless he held it at the same distance.  One artist wrote, “There is no other work to compare with this for excellence, nor could there be”.  The frescoes include more than 300 figures, some of them 18 feet high, and cover a space 118 feet long and 46 feet wide. This was his most famous work.

The Sistine Chapel

Sculptor, Painter, & Architect  He thought of himself as a sculptor, not a painter.  He was a master at many artistic abilities.  Painting  Sculpting  Architecture  He began to apprentice in an artist’s workshop when he was 13 years old.  He learned how to paint backgrounds, create frescoes, and draw with precision.  Lorenzo de’ Medici invited him to join an academy of art, where he learned the techniques of sculpture.  He later moved to Rome, where he studied the ancient city’s sculpture, architecture, and painting.

Michelangelo’s Pietá  His first major work that gave him a reputation of a master sculptor  Michelangelo’s Pieta was said to be the most beautiful work of marble in all of Rome.

Pieta  The Pietá still remains in Rome & can be found in St. Peter’s Basilica.

Michelangelo’s Statue of David  Michelangelo created a sculpture of David (a young biblical hero who killed the giant Goliath) in  It was made from a colossal block of marble that had been discarded years earlier by another sculptor because it was flawed.  His ability to make this masterpiece out of a flawed piece of marble marked him as the greatest sculptor of his age.

Michelangelo’s Sculpture of David

Return to Florence  In 1517, Michelangelo returned to Florence. The pope asked him to design the front of the Medici family church there.  During this project he had to train workers to quarry marble and have a road built through a mountain to transport it.  Quarry: to obtain stone from a pit or excavation by cutting, digging, or blasting it.  He designed the tombs for Lorenzo de Medici and his brother.  He also agreed to design a library to be attached to the Medici church.  Pope Paul III named Michelangelo the chief painter, sculptor, and architect of the Vatican.

The Last Judgment  Pope Paul III also asked Michelangelo to paint the Sistine Chapel wall with the theme of the Last Judgment, when all living and dead people would stand before God to be judged.  The Last Judgment took him 5 years to complete. He was 66 years old when he finished.  The strain of the work took its toll on his health.

The Last Judgment  It is a work of great power that depicts Jesus cursing the damned and welcoming the blessed. Its brown and orange colors, as well as the expressions and movements of Jesus and the other figures, give it a gloomy, even grim, feeling.

Last Project  At 71 years of age, Michelangelo was appointed chief architect for St. Peter’s Basilica.  He worked on the exterior of the building.  He also worked on its dome, which became a model for domes throughout the western world.  He continued working almost until the day he died in  He said, “ I regret that I am dying just as I am beginning to learn the alphabet of my profession.”  He never married, but said his wife, “was his art,” and his children “the works I shall leave.”