Leonardo Da Vinci – Leonardo’s Animals Part 1 of 2
Leonardo da Vinci was born in 1492 on a Tuscan farm in Anchiano, Italy, near the town of Vinci, where he spent most of his childhood. He was the son of Ser Piero and a girl named Caterina who worked for him. After Leonardo’s birth, his father and mother did not stay together. Only recently have details of Leonardo’s biological mother come to light. In 2002, Alessandro Vezzosi, director of the Leonardo da Vinci Museum in Vinci, Italy, told the press that they had found substantial evidence that Leonardo’s mother was a slave and not a peasant, as previously believed.(1) Vezzosi continued. reporting that Leonardo’s father was a craftsman who owned a Middle Eastern slave named Caterina. And, according to her discovery, a few months after Caterina gave birth to Leonardo, he married her to one of the workers.
Leonardo lived in Anchiana and in Vinci until he was eight years old. Later, he moved to Florence with his father. When Leonardo was 14 years old, he became an apprentice to the famous sculptor and painter Andrea del Verrocchio in Florence. In that period, Verrocchio was the leading Florentine artist. When Leonardo was between 21 and 23 years old, he had become a very skilled painter. Verrocchio allowed Leonardo to help with an important painting, The Baptism of Christ (Uffizi Gallery, Florence). Leonardo painted the background and the kneeling angel. It is said that when Verrocchio saw that Leonardo could paint better than anyone, including himself, he stopped painting forever. Verrocchio decided that he would concentrate on sculpture.
Leonardo da Vinci was said to have a great love for animals, and his diaries further illustrate this. He was a vegetarian, at least in the latter part of his life (we have no definitive proof that he was a strict vegetarian in his early years). He wrote: “The time will come when men like myself will regard the killing of animals as they now view the killing of men.” He also commented, “The Littlest Cat is a masterpiece.”
In the 1480s Leonardo painted Lady with an Ermine. The Lady in the painting is Cecilia Gallerani, the 17-year-old mistress of Ludovico Sforza, Duke of Milan. She wears an ermine for three reasons. First of all, for the Duke of Milan, who had been made a member of the Order of the Ermine by Ferdinand I of Naples, the ermine was the heraldic symbol on his coat of arms. Second, the ermine was considered a symbol of virtue and purity. And finally, it was a play on the name of Cecilia Gallerani since the ermine’s Greek name is “galee”.
In Leonardo’s notebooks, he wrote that the stoat eats every other day. Most likely, the stoat, an animal related to the sable and the weasel, remained in the studio while the painting was completed. In the Renaissance period, soft-haired brushes were made from ermine tail tips. Brushes were also made from squirrel skin and held in place with goose or chicken feathers, another reason the ermine might have been at home in the studio.
Leonardo da Vinci included cats in many of his sketches. On a sheet of animal sketches in his notebook, the artist portrayed more than twenty cats and a dragon. He drew cats in different poses, alone, with other cats, and being hugged and hugged. The sketches of him are vivid and reveal the solemn affection he had for felines.
From the mid to late 1470s, Leonardo worked on a number of different studies related to the theme of the Virgin and Christ Child, holding a cat. It was originally thought that no paintings existed beyond his initial studies for these paintings. Recently; however, the Madonna with the Cat, housed in the collection of industrialist Carlo Noya in Savona, Italy, was found to be a painting by none other than Leonardo.(2) The painting is based on a legend about the birth of a cat at the same time as the baby Jesus.
Other sketches for pictures that present animals and are based on a legend or myth is that of Leda and the swan. Although no actual paintings exist, there are countless drawings. The story is that Leda was seduced by the god Zeus in the form of a swan and gave birth to two eggs, resulting in the creation of Helen of Troy with Clytemnestra and Castor with Pollux.
Although there are countless studies and sketches made by Leonardo, only 13 or 14 actual paintings exist today. One of them is the Virgin and Child with Saint Anne, painted between 1508 and 1510. The figures represented are related to each other and the child Jesus is shown holding tightly a little lamb. Da Vinci painted the lamb with sensitivity and detail. The lamb is a symbol of the sacrificial death of Jesus Christ for humanity. Leonardo’s animal themes are based on reality and full of vitality.