The Life of Leo the Lefty

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Leonardo DaVinci, arguably one of if not the most talented man of all time. Leonardo was brilliant and creative. DaVinci was an artist before his time. He grew up in the Renaissance but, is known as a realist. He did some of the best research that contributed to the inventions that we enjoy now. During his life he painted two of the most famous realistic paintings ever, Mona Lisa and The Last Supper. Leonardo DaVinci is one of the greatest people to walk this earth.

Growing up it was unsure how little Leo would turn out. Leonardo was born on Saturday April 15, 1452 at 3 a.m. (Frere 29) and died May 2, 1519 at age 67(mos 2). He was born in Tuscany, a little town near Italy. His father Ser Piero di Antonio, a rich noble, and his mother Caterina, a peasant, never got married but, supplied him with 17 half brothers and sisters (29). Both his parents later went on to marry different people (29). Until the age of five he lived with his mother then moved in with his father and stepmother (30). In his father’s house he was raised by his grandmother and uncle (30). Despite his unfortunate start in life Leonardo overcame most, if not all of peoples’ expectations of him.

At a young age Leonardo’s father knew it was his destiny to become an artist. In his father’s house Leonardo had the best teaching a rich noble could afford (mos 2). While living in his dad’s house he was taught scholarly text and Vinci’s printing tradition (1). After his uncle left and his grandparents died, Leonardo’s father wasted no time grooming Leonardo’s artistic talent. He sent Leonardo to the Bottega studio to work as Andrea di Francesco di Cione, better known as Verrocchio, apprentice (Frere 30). Verrocchio was a famous sculptor and painter who help Leonardo real...

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...ver crossed anyone’s mind.

The occurrence of the realism movement happened for reasons known and unknown. One known fact is that realism was a revolt against the art forms of romanticism and classicalism (Lipking 171). As times change so do interest and technology, the rising popularity of industrialism and the people’s desire for an understanding of realistic social life gave birth to realism (171). The artist of realism wanted people to see that life is real and that when an artist changes life people get a false reality of life (artcyclopedia 1). This movement shone light on the real world and gave people the ability to save a piece of history forever.

The rise and fall of realism happened over the period of approximately a century. In the late 1700’s realism was a noticeable movement but, in the mid-1800’s it had became a dominant artform (Boekoff and Kallen).

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