Leonardo da Vinci
A painter, sculptor, architect, engineer, and scientist
Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519), Florentine artist, one of the great masters of the High Renaissance. His profound love of knowledge and research was the keynote of both his artistic and scientific endeavors. His innovations in the field of painting influenced the course of Italian art for more than a century after his death, and his scientific studies - particularly in the fields of anatomy, optics, and hydraulics - anticipated many of the developments of modern science.
Paintings
• Leonardo produced a relatively small number of paintings, but he was an extraordinarily innovative and influential artist;
his well-known paintings: The Adoration of the Magi, The Last• Supper, The Mona Lisa, Leonardo's most famous work, is as well known for its mastery of technical innovations as for the mysteriousness of its legendary smiling subject;