Leonardo: Detail from The Virgin on the Rocks. Leonardo characterises the spirit of the Renaissance: he spent his life in the pursuit of knowledge, and was as revered for his vast intellect as he was for his astonishing skill as an artist. Leonardo da Vinci was not only one of the greatest artists of the Renaissance, but also perhaps the most versatile genius who ever lived. His interests embraced virtually every field of study then known.
Anatomy and geology were two of his passions, and his great dream was man-powered flight. But his perfectionism meant that he finished comparatively few Major paintings.
Leonardo was born near Florence, but the scene of his most ambitious undertakings was Milan. He spent his last years in France as the guest of King Francis I, revered as no previous artist had been.
Although so many of his projects were unfulfilled, his marvellous drawings are eloquent testimony to the power of his incomparably inventive mind. Vinci in Italy, birthplace of Leonardo. He was the illegitimate son of a rising Florentine legal official, Ser Piero da Vinci. Tuscany, Italy.
Certainly he began drawing and painting at an early age. Apprentices such as Leonardo worked their way up from sweeping floors to mixing colours to helping out in the production of commissioned paintings. Leonardo had reached this stage by the age of 20, when Verrocchio gave him responsibility for painting one of the angels in The Baptism of Christ. Verrocchio: The Baptism of Christ. Florence in the 15th century was one of the great cultural centres of the world, and Leonardo would have come into contact with many of the scholars whose new ideas and learning were shaping the intellectual climate of Renaissance Italy.
