THE RENAISSANCE MAN

A polymath, scientist, mathematician, engineer, inventor, anatomist, painter, sculptor, architect, botanist, musician and writer combined together!!!!!
cant find out who he is.. here's a clue:
his works include "THE ADORATION OF THE MAGI" and "MADONNA OF THE ROCKS"

still didn't get it.. here's something simpler..

he exhumed corpses from graveyards and studied them.. after loads of research, he came out with the VITRUVIAN MAN, a work of art that gave the most accurate dimensions of human anatomy..

still didn't get it??? well, here's the simplest of them all..

he was the creater of one of the most controversial and most popular paintings of all time, the MONA LISA!!!

ah, now you got it.. yup, am referring to none other than LEONARDO DA VINCI..

Born in vinci, a small town in florence, his full birth name was "Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci", meaning "Leonardo, (son) of (Mes)ser Piero from Vinci".. nothin much is known about his early years.. at the age of 14, he apprenticed under one of the most successful artisies of his times, Verrocchio..

The artistic talent of Da Vinci is well known, his ADORATION OF THE MAGI, MADONNA OF THE ROCKS, THE LAST SUPPER and the MONA LISA being immensely popular works of art.. But his scientific talents have not really come under the notice of the larger section of public..



What people didnt know was that Da Vinci was an immensely talented inventor as well.. As an engineer, Leonardo conceived ideas vastly ahead of his own time, conceptually inventing a helicopter, a tank, the use of concentrated solar power, a calculator, a rudimentary theory of plate tectonics the double hull. In practice, he greatly advanced the state of knowledge in the fields of anatomy, astronomy, civil engineering, optics, and the study of water (hydrodynamics). his most famous inventions include a helicopter, a parachute, a paraglider, a fully functional model of a french medeival knight and many other war machines.. but sadly none of them materialised..








A few years back, a team from bbc put together the machine but though it worked, it didnt move forward as was given in the draft.. the team modified a small gear and the machine worked perfectly.. it was later found out that Da Vinci did it on purpose just to avoid people from copying his works..

Da Vinci had other strange habits as well.. if you look closely at the pistures posted above, you'll notice that all the scripts have been written in a strange language.. look closely and you'll absorb that it is just english written in mirror writing ( mirror image of the actual text, this feature was shown in the movie THE DA VINCI CODE).. Such was the ingenuity of Da Vinci.. not only this he had other strange traits as well.. da vinci was known to buy caged birds and after studying them, he released them from their cages.. in 1505 he came out with a manuscript titled "CODEX ON THE FLIGHT OF BIRDS" which begins with an examination of the flight behavior of birds and proposes mechanisms for flight by machines. such were his observation skills..

Da Vinci had an unknown side as well which the church didnt like.. as exposed by DAN BROWN in his book "THE DA VINCI CODE", he was actually a GRANDMASTER of the PRIORY OF SION, a secret society that believed in pagan worship and worshipped the SACRED FEMININE.. it was believed that da vinci incorporated many feminine and rather "un-church" like symbols into his paintings.. His "LAST SUPPER" fresco has come into a lot of controvercy after dan brown explained in his book that instead of 12 male disciples as originally given in the bible, he had painted 11 male and one female.. the female was actually mary magdalene, who was believed by the PRIORY OF SION, to be the wife of jesus christ!!!!!!



Well, i could just keep going on and on about this great man.. but time and words fail me.. he pioneered the SFUMATO style of painting.. The Italian word sfumato (pp. of fumare, 'to smoke') captures the idea precisely. The finished product appears as though a veil of smoke had drifted between the subject of the painting and the viewer.. THE MONA LISA was painted using this technique.. well, jus like the style he was famous for, his life has also been unclear.. there have always been shades of doubt in the mind of the people whenever it came to da vinci.. why didn't he marry?? why didn't he finish most of his painting assignments?? why did he incorporate unchurch like articles into his works?? why did he act like a pious christian in front of the public but headed a secret anti church society?? these and many more questions still remain unanswered..

doubts may linger in people's mind regarding the life of da vinci, but his sheer brilliance remains unquestionable.. he still remains one of the most talented human beings to have ever walked on earth..

This, my friends is my tribute to the EPITOME OF MYSTERY, LEONARDO DA VINCI..


P.S: a team of researchers and builders have decided to bring Da Vinci's creation to life.. the show is currntly being aired on DISCOVERY CHANNEL titled "DOING DA VINCI", every friday night at 9.. don't forget to watch it..


p.s: after publishing this blog post, i accidentally stumbled on an article published in http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1935965/posts

this is how it goes:

Did Da Vinci Hide God's Face In Painting
The Telegraph (UK) ^ | 12-7-2007 | Aislinn Simpson

Posted on Friday, December 07, 2007 9:19:29 AM by blam

Edited on Saturday, December 08, 2007 4:02:32 AM by Lead Moderator. [history]

Did Da Vinci hide God's face in painting?

By Aislinn Simpson
Last Updated: 2:54am GMT 07/12/2007

A new storm is brewing in the world of Da Vinci theorists after a mysterious group claimed it has used mirrors to uncover hidden biblical images in some of the great master’s most famous works.

The Mirror of the Sacred Scriptures and Paintings In recent years, art history scholars have unveiled Templar knights, Mary Magdalene, a child and a musical script hidden in the Italian’s paintings.

[Mod: Images removed due to threat of legal action from source]

These images, from the group's website, show how the original The Virgin and Child sketch (left) can be manipulated with mirrors to supposedly show the ancient Old Testament god Jahveh (right)

It is well-documented that Da Vinci, who lived between 1452 and 1519, often wrote in mirror writing, either in an attempt to stop his rivals stealing his ideas or in a bid to hide his scientific theories, often deemed as subversive, from the powerful Roman Catholic Church.

But now a group known as The Mirror of the Sacred Scriptures and Paintings World Foundation believes that he applied the same technique to some of his best-known creations, including the Mona Lisa and the Last Supper, to conceal mysterious faces and religious symbols.

When applied to the sketch The Virgin and Child with Saint Anne and Saint John the Baptist, which hangs in London’s National Gallery, the authors say the mirror image reveals the ancient Old Testament god Jahveh, who "protects the soul of the body’s vices" and wears the Vatican’s crown.

Their theory would explain why many of Da Vinci’s characters seem to be pointing or staring into space, as if searching for the Divine.

The group claims they are indicating where the mirror should be placed to reveal the painting’s secrets.

In the Virgin and Child sketch, they say, it explains why John the Baptist appears to be staring past Jesus into the distance.

A similar face appears when a mirror is applied to the right hand shoulder of Mona Lisa, and the experts also claim to have found an upturned holy grail on the table in front of Christ in the celebrated Last Supper fresco.

The mirror-technique is applied to another painting of John the Baptist to reveal the four-legged image of creation and the Tree of Life in Adam and Eve’s Garden of Eden.

Again, John is pointing with both hands to the place where the mirror needs to be placed to reveal the "hidden" image.

According to the group, the same technique was used by Michelangelo and Raphael, in artwork exhibited in the Vatican, and Renaissance artists including the neoclassicist Jacques Louis David. Similar images have also been found in famous paintings and sculptures of Buddha.

The Mona Lisa supposedly shows a similar face

The study’s authors wrote to the Vatican last year to explain their discovery, but received a lofty reply saying that while their findings would no doubt be the object of much discussion in the art history world, their ideas required "solid proof" and needed to be supported by a general consensus among art critics before they could be taken seriously.

Critics of the project will claim the authors want to cash in on the worldwide fascination with Da Vinci conspiracy theories, brought to a head by the publication of Dan Brown’s Da Vinci Code and the subsequent Tom Hanks film.

These featured the theory that the male figure on Christ’s immediate right is actually Mary Magdalene and the couple had descendants living in the modern world, and multiplied visits to sites all over the world to which Da Vinci was linked.

The latest theory, expounded by The Mirror of the Sacred Scriptures and Paintings group, whose website www.mirrorandart.com, is owned by the Sacred and Divine Reason and Foundation Corp, follows the revelation in July by an Italian amateur scholar that the Last Supper contained a hidden image of a woman holding a child.

The figure, he said, appeared when the fresco was superimposed with its mirror image and both were made partially transparent.

yet another example of da vinci's ingenuity.. the more i read about him, the more i get fascinated.. kudos to Da Vinci!!!!!!