At a very early age, Lionardo da Vinci showed remarkably quick abilities for everything he turned his attention to, but more particularly for arithmetic, music, and drawing. His drawings appeared something wonderful to his father, who showed them to Andrea Verocchio, and that celebrated artist, greatly surprised at seeing productions of such merit from an uninstructed hand, willingly took Lionardo as a pupil. He was soon much more astonished when he perceived the rapid progress his pupil made; he felt his own inferiority, and when Lionardo painted an angel in a picture of the Baptism of Christ, in S. Salvi at Vallombrosa, so much superior to the other figures that it rendered the inferiority of Verocchio apparent to all, he immediately relinquished the pencil for ever. This picture is now in the academy at Florence. The first original work by Lionardo, mentioned by Vasari, was the so-called Rotella del Fico, a round board of a fig-tree, upon which his father requested him to paint something for one of his tenants. Lionardo, wishing to astonish his father, determined to execute something extraordinary, that should produce the effect of the Head of Medusa; and having prepared the rotella, and covered it with plaster, he collected almost every kind of reptile, and composed from them a monster of most horrible appearance; it seemed alive, its eyes flashed fire, and it appeared to breathe destruction from its open mouth. The picture produced the desired effect upon his father, who thought it so wonderful that he carried it immediately to a picture dealer in Florence, sold it for a hundred ducats, and purchased for a trifle an ordinary piece for his tenant.
EXTRAORDINARY TALENTS OF DA VINCI.
Lionardo da Vinci was endowed by nature with a genius uncommonly elevated and penetrating, eager after discovery, and diligent in the pursuit, not only in what related to painting, sculpture, and architecture, but in mathematics, mechanics, hydrostatics, music, poetry, botany, astronomy, and also in the accomplishments of horsemanship, fencing, and dancing. Unlike most men of versatile talent, he was so perfect in all these, that when he performed any one, the beholders were ready to imagine that it must have been his sole study. To such vigor of intellect he joined an elegance of features and manners, that graced the virtues of his mind; he was affable with strangers, with citizens, with private individuals, and with princes. This extraordinary combination of qualities in a single man, soon spread his fame over all Italy.
DA VINCI’S WORKS AT MILAN.
In 1494, Da Vinci was invited to Milan by the Duke Lodovico Sforza, who appointed him Director of the Academy of Painting and Architecture, which he had recently revived with additional splendor and encouragement. During his residence there, he painted but little, with the exception of his celebrated picture of the Last Supper, a description of which will be found in a subsequent article. As Director of the Academy, he banished all the dry, gothic principles established by his predecessor, Michelino, and introduced the beautiful simplicity and purity of the Grecian and Roman styles. Lanzi says that in this capacity, “he left a degree of refinement at Milan, so productive of illustrious pupils that this period may be ranked as the most glorious era of his life.” The Duke engaged Lionardo in the stupendous project of conducting the waters of the Adda, from Mortesana, through the Valteline, and the valley of the Chiavenna to the walls of Milan, a distance of nearly two hundred miles. Sensible of the greatness of this undertaking, Lionardo applied himself more closely to those branches of philosophy and mathematics which are most adapted to mechanics, and finally accomplished this immense work, greatly to the astonishment and admiration of all Italy. He executed the model for a colossal bronze equestrian statue of the Duke’s father, Francesco Sforza, and would have completed it, but the Duke’s affairs were becoming greatly embarrassed, so that the necessary metal (200,000 lbs.) was not furnished. In 1500, Lodovico Sforza was overthrown in battle by the French, made prisoner, and conducted to France, where he soon after died in the castle of Loches. The Academy was suppressed, the professors dispersed, and Lionardo, after losing all, was obliged to quit the city, and take refuge in Florence.
DA VINCI’S “BATTLE OF THE STANDARD.”
Soon after Lionardo’s return to Florence, in 1503, he was commissioned by the Gonfalonière Soderini to decorate one side of the Council Hall of the Palazzo Vecchio, while Michael Angelo was engaged to paint the opposite side. Lionardo selected the battle in which the Milanese general, Niccolo Piccinino, was defeated by the Florentines at Anghiari, near Borgo San Sepolcro. This composition, of which he only made the cartoon of a part, was called the Battle of the Standard; it represents a group of horsemen contending for a standard, with various accessories. Vasari praises the beauty and anatomical correctness of the horses, and the costumes of the soldiers. Lanzi says it was never executed, after his failing in an attempt to paint it in a new method upon the wall, but Lucini afterwards represented it in a painting which is in the Ambrosian Library at Milan, esteemed one of the finest works in that collection. The fame of this contest between the two great artists, caused great excitement, and induced Raffaelle, who had recently quitted the school of Perugino, to visit Florence. The grace and delicacy of Lionardo’s style, compared with the dry and gothic manner of Perugino, excited the admiration of the young painter, and inspired him with a more modern taste.
LIONARDO DA VINCI AND LEO X.
The patronage extended to the arts by Leo X., induced Lionardo to visit Rome. Accordingly, in 1514, he went to that metropolis, in the train of Duke Giuliano de Medici, by whom he was introduced to the Pope, who soon after signified his intention of employing Lionardo’s pencil. Upon this, the painter began to distil his oils and prepare his varnishes, which the Pope seeing, exclaimed with surprise, that “nothing could be expected of a painter who thought of finishing his works before he had begun them.” This want of courtesy in the Pope offended Lionardo, and according to Vasari, was the reason why he immediately quitted Rome in disgust. It is probable, however, that the talents and fame of Buonarotti and Raffaelle had more to do with producing the dissatisfaction of this great painter, who was then declining into the vale of years.