Leonardo's notebooks

About a year ago, there was an exhibit in Denver that featured the inventions of Leonardo da Vinci. I went three times. I (am) was so intrigued by this man’s mind—his amazing creativity across a whole range of domains, his ability to imagine contraptions into existence, his incredible powers of observation. I kept going back, and each time I saw new things.

Well, my partner spotted my fascination with all things Leonardo, so she just gifted me with a book called Leonardo’s Notebooks: Writing and Art of the Great Master. And today, wonder of wonders, I actually found myself with a spare hour to begin reading it. I was so enthralled by this book, I figured I needed to pass on my excitement—much as I did last year, dragging other folks to the exhibit.

So now I've entered a new phase of my enthusiasm about Leonardo. As you likely know, Leonardo da Vinci was a 15th century largely self-taught, multi-media genius. The exhibit I visited over and over last year featured his inventions, many of which anticipated (by centuries) later technological "innovations." I won’t dwell on those (although I could!) because I did that in an earlier blog. And then another one. I’ll just share a couple of pictures to remind you how grand this exhibit was.

  

 

  

At that exhibit, my partner and I also saw a movie that dealt more with da Vinci's historical context, his life, and his art (not that his inventions weren't "art"). He didn’t create many well-known paintings—although a couple are totally iconic:

But his drawings are legion. And, it turns out, so was his writing about art. Some of it borders on poetic ("And if you, O poet, tell a story with your pen, the painter with a brush can tell it more easily, with simpler completeness and less tedious to be understood"). Other parts border on pedantic ("The principle movements of the hand are 10; that is, forwards, backwards, to right and to left, in a circular motion, up or down, to close and to open, and to spread the fingers and to press them together").

This book consists almost entirely of da Vinci’s writings and drawings. The “Leonardo’s Notebooks” of the title refers to several loose collections of da Vinci’s drawing and writings—about 4,000 pages in all. The various “notebooks” are vaguely grouped by topic—but often cover multiple topics, even on a single page.

You may know that he wrote in “mirror writing.” This was not, it turns out, because he was paranoid about people being able to read what he wrote. Nor was it because he had some strange form of dyslexia or a neurological condition that made him see things backwards. Nope, it was because he was left-handed and had the same problem many left-handed folks report (or did back in the day of writing things by hand)—the ink gets smeared as the writer dragged her/his hand along “behind” the pen. But how amazing, whatever the reason! To be able to write both forward (which he also did) and backward. It’s a relatively small slice of his genius, but still …

The notes in this book demonstrate Leonardo’s amazing powers of observation—and his insistence that such careful observation is absolutely key to good art. For instance:

“It is indispensable to a painter to be thoroughly familiar with the limbs in all positions and actions of which they are capable … Then he will know the anatomy of the sinews, bones, muscles, and tendons so that, in their various movements and exertions, he may know which nerve or muscle is the cause of each movement and show those only as prominent and thickened, and not the others.”

To gain the knowledge necessary to be “thoroughly familiar” with all the bones and nerves and muscles and tendons and sinew, da Vinci, was a very careful student of anatomy. This is a bit surprising, as the Catholic Church, which pretty much ruled Europe at that time, forbade autopsies or dissection of any type. But apparently Leonardo had an “in” with the Pope and was allowed to perform autopsies to learn the details of human anatomy. And learn he did. In fact, he made many drawings of those muscles, bones, and sinew—and this precise understanding of the body’s parts allowed him to draw (and then paint) human figures that were remarkable for their anatomic precision and realistic movement. 

In fact, he seems to have been virtually obsessed with precision. Many of his writings go on in great detail about the precise proportions of various body parts to the total body size—and numerous drawings illustrate those principles. Here are some examples of his anatomical drawings, some of which will be familiar. These drawings are in the book, where they are easier to peruse in detail. The versions below are taken from google images, so pardon the variation in size and quality. Just to give you an idea ...

           

            

The same focused and detailed observation is also necessary, he argued, for drawing or painting non-human subjects. A few more (google) examples:

 

But it was not enough to observe the human figure carefully. Paintings often have multiple people, of course, so da Vinci also instructed painters about that:

“To compose [groups of figures] … when you have well learnt perspective and have by heart the parts and forms of objects, you must go about and constantly, as you go, observe, note, and consider the circumstances and behavior of men [sic] talking, quarreling, or laughing and fighting together; the action of the men themselves and the actions of by standers … And take note of them with slight strokes in a little book that you should always carry with you. And it should be of tinted paper, that it may bot ne rubbed out … Change the old [when it is full] for a new one. These things should … be preserved with great care, for the forms and positions of objects are so infinite that the memory is incapable of retaining them, wherefore keep these [sketches] as your guides and masters.” [Isn’t this amazing? What focus, what presence, what total single-minded attention to his work!]

And the details and realistic poses of the figures in his drawings are testimony to how seriously he took his own guidance.

   

Other sections of the book present his notes and drawings about perspective and visual perception, anatomy and physiology, botany and landscape, physical science and astronomy, architecture and city planning, sculpture and metalwork, inventions and experiments (the focus of last year’s exhibit), and assorted other topics ranging from poetry and art to war machines. The book closes with Leonardo’s contributions to the practical wisdom and philosophy of his day—a section I can hardly wait to read.

I’m not sure what my point is here. Partly, I was just so energized by spending some time playing in this man’s mind, and I wanted to share the excitement. Partly, I suppose, writing about this book seems like a bit of an antidote to my last blog, which may have seemed dour or fatalistic. In truth, delving into this book is exactly the sort of experience that keeps me surprised and delighted as life moves forward—a way of staying engaged rather than drifting.

So, maybe you can consider this blog simply an invitation. If you’d enjoy a glimpse into a remarkable mind—and I really mean a remarkable mind—track down this book. Just looking at the pictures will keep you happily amazed for some time. And then, if you have the time and interest to devote to Leonardo’s notes, I think you’ll find that you’ve met genius in black and white. And sometimes sepia.