Leonardo Da Vinci Background (Art History Final)

For my final project I felt a drawing would be best, for I am not much of a painter, a carver, or a photographer. In fact as far as artistic abilities I am really only good at drawing, so it was not hard to decide what I would do. I thought I would have trouble choosing a drawing at first, for many artists we studied were painters, but then I remembered Leonardo Da Vinci was a man of many talents, and one of those talents was drawing.

So I decided to replicate a drawing he had intended to become a sculpture of a horse, but was unfortunately never built in his lifetime. I used simple materials to recreate the drawing, using just a regular pencil, some thick sketching paper, and lots of time and patience. Leonardo Da Vinci was adept at many things such as painting, drawing, sculpting, engineering, and took a special interest in science and anatomy. He was both an artist and a scientist.

In fact, if he were to tell you his profession, he may have told you any number of things: a painter, an engineer, a cartographer. His talents seemed limitless and it appears he made his best efforts to explore all he possibly could of his talents. The horse I decided to replicate was originally meant to be the largest equestrian model in the world. The man who asked Da Vinci to create the sculpture was named Ludovico il Moro. He was the Duke of Milan and requested the statue be built to honor his father, Francesco, in the year of 1482.

Da Vinci first drew sketches of what the statue would look like and began making the sculpture from clay. Unfortunately in 1499 the French destroyed his clay model and the sculpture remained unfinished for centuries. Since 1970, however, there have been many replicas made from Leonardo Da Vinci’s many drawings of the potential horse sculpture. Some of these replicas can be found in Hungary, Italy, and the USA in various sizes and interpretations of the piece.