Da Vinci, Leonardo

Born Vinci, near Florence, Italy about 1452, Da Vinci was an illegitimate child, brought up by his peasant grandparents. His illegitimacy meant he had to be apprenticed to a painter as the professions were for the respectable. The highbrow and fashionable of Florence initially dismissed him and he turned to the study of science and art, where he persistently pursued newness, becoming one of the most important individuals in European history. He believed that there was no authority higher than that of the eye, which was the window on the soul. His is the first true landscape drawing to be known in Western art. A combination of the observation and his religious scepticism possibly led to him being the first artist known to omit halos from religious figures and to place them in domestic situations. ‘Vitruvian Man’ is one of the most well-known of the intricate images from his famous notebooks, in which the notes are made backwards in mirror writing. His writings and sketches, including botany, music, a parachute, a helicopter, contact lenses, and a form of plastics, were sometimes centuries before their time. Died Cloux, Near Amboise, France 1519. His remains were dispersed during the 30 Years War, and his tomb is now lost.