Leonardo da Vinci: Education and Training of a Renaissance Man
Leonardo da Vinci, a towering figure of the High Renaissance, is celebrated as a painter, draughtsman, engineer, scientist, theorist, sculptor, and architect. While his artistic achievements initially brought him fame, his extensive notebooks, filled with drawings and notes on diverse subjects such as anatomy, astronomy, botany, cartography, painting, and paleontology, have solidified his reputation as a true polymath. Leonardo's approach to learning and training was unconventional, shaped by his unique circumstances and insatiable curiosity.
Early Life and Informal Education
Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci was born on April 15, 1452, in or near Vinci, Italy, the illegitimate son of Ser Piero, a successful Florentine notary, and Caterina, a woman of lower social class. As Walter Isaacson points out in his biography, Leonardo's illegitimacy, paradoxically, proved to be advantageous. Had he been legitimate, he likely would have been compelled to join the family business as a notary and would have received a traditional education.
Growing up in his father's Vinci home, Leonardo had access to scholarly texts owned by family and friends. Deprived of a formal education, Leonardo acquired knowledge solely through observation and curiosity. This freedom allowed him to learn without the constraints of man-made conformities, fostering a sense of liberation. He saw every subject as equally important and informing of the other, believing that each was essential to unlock the limitless possibilities of human thought and creativity.
Apprenticeship Under Verrocchio
Around the age of 15, his father apprenticed him to Andrea del Verrocchio, a renowned sculptor and painter in Florence. When you think of Leonardo da Vinci, it’s unlikely that you think of him as da Vinci, the apprentice artist. However, da Vinci was, indeed, an apprentice artist at one point in his life. During those years, he learned the old masters' painting techniques that we have come to associate with his work. Like all the artists of his time, da Vinci learned how to draw like an old master by studying under a master. According to History Extra, da Vinci’s father made a contract with Verrocchio.
A standard artist-apprentice contract would require the apprentice artist to be diligent and honest in his work, which might include grinding paint pigments, priming paint panels and preparing the master artist's studio for the day. As da Vinci became more skilled, he would have taken on more difficult work, including helping Verrocchio with his paintings. In exchange for this, da Vinci would have been fed, clothed, and housed for the six years of his apprenticeship.
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Under Verrocchio, Leonardo learned drawing, painting, sculpting, carpentry, leather arts, and mechanical arts. Da Vinci became Verrocchio’s apprentice when he was just 14 years old. It was during this time that the artist developed many of the stylistic elements that people would associate with him, including sfumato.
His genius began to surface even as an apprentice. One of Leonardo's first big breaks was to paint an angel in Verrochio's "Baptism of Christ," and Leonardo was so much better than his master's that Verrochio allegedly resolved never to paint again. There is some thought that Lenardo helped Verrachio compete his painting called the “Baptism of Christ”. It has been said that Leanardo painted part of the background and the young angel holding the robe of Jesus. Artist Giorgio Vasari even wrote that Verrachio was humbled by the superior talent of his pupil that he stopped painting after that. Although there is no confirmation to such theories and most scholars dismiss this notion.
It was during his apprenticeship that Leonardo developed the skills and techniques that would later define his artistic style. Da Vinci did, in fact, become a member of that guild in 1472, though he continued to work with Verrocchio for another four years.
Independent Work and Continued Learning
Da Vinci left Verrocchio’s studio in 1478. In January 1478, Leonardo received an independent commission to paint an altarpiece for the Chapel of Saint Bernard in the Florentine town hall, the Palazzo della Signoria, an indication of his independence from Verrocchio's studio. His first independent work was an altar piece that would reside in a chapel in Florence. He left the city and abandoned a job that was requested by the Augustinian monks three years later.
Seeking to make a living, and new challenges, he entered the service of the Duke of Milan in 1482, abandoning his first commission in Florence, "The Adoration of the Magi". In 1482, ruler of Florence commissioned Da Vinci to create a silver lyre and bring it as a peace gesture to the ruler of Milan. After completing this job, Da Vinci tried to convince the Duke of Milan to provide him a job as a Military Engineer. He doesn’t mention to him his considerable talent as an artist. He was hired and remained in that service for 17 years. During this time he did his earliest known work, a pen and ink drawing of a landscape in the Arno valley.
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During his time in Milan, Leonardo truly emerged as a Renaissance Man. He did not see a difference between art and science and saw that they merged in many ways and that studying science made him a better artist. He also studied botany, zoology, hydraulics, aeronautics and physics. He categorized his sketches in these areas as painting, architecture, mechanics and human anatomy. Most of his writings were theoretical and hardly experimental.
Da Vinci's Approach to Interdisciplinary Learning
Da Vinci left more than 7,200 pages of journal entries, a mere one-quarter of what he actually wrote. The juxtapositions seem haphazard, and to some extent they are; we watch his mind and pen leap from an insight about mechanics, to a doodle of hair curls and water eddies, to a drawing of a face, to an ingenious contraption, to an anatomical sketch, all accompanied by mirror-script notes and musings. But the joy of these juxtapositions is that they allow us to marvel at the beauty of a universal mind as it wanders exuberantly in free-range fashion over the arts and sciences and, by doing so senses the connections in our cosmos.
For da Vinci, every subject was equally important and informing of the other. Each was essential if one were to unlock the limitless possibilities of human thought and creativity. This kind of approach to interdisciplinary learning is not unique to da Vinci. Actually, it is ancient. The Greeks categorized music under the umbrella of a single tri-disciplinary subject that included math and astronomy.
Later Life and Legacy
Back to Milan - after Ludovico Sforza's fall from power in 1499 - Leonardo searched for a new patron. He spent 17 years in Milan, leaving only after Duke Ludovico Sforza's fall from power in 1499. The Duke kept Leonardo busy painting and sculpting and designing elaborate court festivals, but he also had Leonardo design weapons, buildings, and machinery. From 1485 to 1490, Leonardo produced studies on many subjects, including nature, flying machines, geometry, mechanics, municipal construction, canals and architecture (designing everything from churches to fortresses).
Over the next 16 years, Leonardo worked and traveled throughout Italy for a number of employers, including the infamous Cesare Borgia. In Cesena in 1502, Leonardo entered the service of Cesare Borgia, the son of Pope Alexander VI, acting as a military architect and engineer and travelling throughout Italy with his patron. Leonardo created a map of Cesare Borgia's stronghold, a town plan of Imola in order to win his patronage. Upon seeing it, Cesare hired Leonardo as his chief military engineer and architect. Later in the year, Leonardo produced another map for his patron, one of Chiana Valley, Tuscany, so as to give his patron a better overlay of the land and greater strategic position.
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About 1503, Leonardo reportedly began work on the "Mona Lisa." By this same month, Leonardo had begun working on a portrait of Lisa del Giocondo, the model for the Mona Lisa, which he would continue working on until his later years.
Following the death of his patron Giuliano de' Medici in March of 1516, he was offered the title of Premier Painter and Engineer and Architect of the King by Francis I in France. Leonardo entered Francis's service later that year, and was given the use of the manor house Clos Lucé near the King's residence at the royal Château d'Amboise.
Leonardo died at Clos Lucé on May 2, 1519, at the age of 67, possibly of a stroke.
Lessons from Leonardo's Education
Leonardo da Vinci's education and training offer several valuable lessons:
- Embrace Curiosity: Leonardo approached the world with a fearless ambition to expand his mind, driven by an insatiable curiosity.
- Value Observation and Experience: He believed the best way to learn was through observation and experience, spending hours studying the natural world.
- Break Down Disciplinary Boundaries: Leonardo saw no boundaries between art, science, and other disciplines, recognizing the interconnectedness of knowledge.
- Seek Mentorship: His apprenticeship with Verrocchio provided him with essential skills and guidance, highlighting the importance of mentorship in skill development.
- Never Stop Learning: Leonardo remained a lifelong learner, constantly seeking new knowledge and experiences.
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