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Leonardo Da Vinci

Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci, April 15, 1452 – May 2, 1519, was a scientist, mathematician, engineer, inventor, anatomist, painter, sculptor, architect, botanist, musician and writer and pupil of the renowned Florentine sculptor and painter, Verrocchio.

Self Portrait

Painter
It is primarily as a painter that Leonardo was and is renowned. Two of his works, the Mona Lisa and The Last Supper occupy unique positions as the most famous, most reproduced and most parodied portrait and religious painting of all time, their fame approached only by Michelangelo's Creation of Adam.

Inventor 

As an engineer, Leonardo's ideas were vastly ahead of his time. He conceptualised a helicopter, a tank, concentrated solar power, a calculator, the double hull and outlined a rudimentary theory of plate tectonics. Relatively few of his designs were constructed or were even feasible during his lifetime, but some of his smaller inventions, such as an automated bobbin winder and a machine for testing the tensile strength of wire, entered the world of manufacturing unheralded. As a scientist, he greatly advanced the state of knowledge in the fields of anatomy, civil engineering, optics, and hydrodynamics.

Scientist
Leonardo drew many studies of the human skeleton and its parts, as well as muscles and sinews, the heart and vascular system, and other internal organs. He made one of the first scientific drawings of a fetus in utero. He was given permission to dissect human corpses at the hospital Santa Maria Nuova in Florence and later at hospitals in Milan and Rome. He collaborated with the doctor Marcantonio della Torre and together they prepared a theoretical work on anatomy for which Leonardo made more than 200 drawings.

Schetch Artist
Leonardo was a prolific draftsman, keeping journals full of small sketches and detailed drawings recording all manner of things that took his attention. As well as the journals there exist many studies for paintings.