Leonardo My Hero

Ebony - 9th Grade

I think that Leonardo da Vinci was a great and wonderful artist. He lived an artistic life and loved the work he did. He drew and painted many pictures that are now famous. Leonardo da Vinci is now recognized for the outstanding work that his artistry has gained him over time.
One day I would like to become a terrific artist that Leonardo da Vinci is known to be.

Nicole - 9th Grade

During 1500-1506, Leonardo's years in Florence, he completed more projects than in any other period of his life. It was during these years he completed the painting of the Mona Lisa. When the painting was completed, it became famous immediately. It was copied in Italy, France, Flanders and Spain. The Mona Lisa is known as La Gioconda in Italy and La Jaconde in France.
Some people say the Mona Lisa resembles the painter. Some people also say that the smile he gave the Mona Lisa indicates the qualities and virtue he looks for in women. If that were the case, the Mona Lisa would be the first painting in the world to be perfectly pure in intention. Vasari says that Leonardo obtained the Mona Lisa smile by having the sitter surrounded by musicians, singers and clowns.

Frederick - 12th Grade

The Mona Lisa mystique began with Vasari's meticulous but fanciful description, on which he insisted on non-existant details.
The passion that some people have for the Mona Lisa has reached a new height in the 19th Century an its echoes continue to run through the culture of today.
In 1914 the Russian radical painter Kazimir Malevich used the Mona Lisa in a collage painting x-ing out the face.
In 1919 the French Dadaist Marcel Duchamp put a mustache on a reproduction and adorned it with disrespect.
In 1963 Andy Warhol made the Mona Lisa into one of his icons of mass production and is endlessly repeated.

Her legendary indirect gaze provokes a reaction known as the Mona Lisa Syndrome. The identity of Mona Lisa is a mystery. In Italy, she is known as La Gioconda, "the merry one", referring to her subtle smile, and possibly a play on the name of the sitter, who may have been Lisa Gherardini del Gioconda. Vasari, the early biographer, maintained that Leonardo "painted the portrait of the wife of Piero Francesco del Gioconda," that was not his wife.
The drawing of the Bridge is often identified as that of Buriano, near Arezzo.
There is also a Nude Gioconda, known only through versions by Leonardo's followers.

Nana - 9th Grade

Leonardo's Notebooks reveals a spirit of scientific inquiry and a mechanical inventiveness that were centuries ahead of their time.
About 1472 Leonardo, during his apprenticeship, painted an angel and vaporous landscape in Verrocchio's Baptism of Christ, the first certain evidence of his activity as a painter.
The Last Supper may be called the first major painting of the High Renaissance. The impatient artist rejected slow traditional fresco techniques of working with water color, and developed his own. He mixed oil and tempra pigments and used them on a ground of resin, pitch and plaster. Within 20 years, the work was in a ruinous state, with the painting separating from the masonry. Over the centuries it continued to crumble. It was also damaged by exposure following a bombing raid during World War II. After the war what remained of the work was restored through modern processes.

Sokallyan - 12th Grade

In Milan, Leonardo was interested in engineering. He was in the Duke's numerous military enterprises and he was also active as an architect. Most of Leonardo's work was unfinished or destroyed.
The Mona Lisa is the only portrait from the second Florentine period that survives. The Mona Lisa is a mystery and is different from all his other work. This painting has a little mystery. You would never expect this outcome once I tell you. In a web site called Why is the Mona Lisa Smiling? will tell you about one of Leonardo's most famous paintings, the Mona Lisa.
She seems to be mysterious in many ways. Some people wonder why she is smiling. Some people say it is Leonardo da Vinci himself. And in this web site it is proven that Mona Lisa is Leonardo. She is smiling because he had fooled the whole world for more than five centuries.
Leonardo da Vinci was a Forentine artist during the Italian Renaissance and today he is known to be one of the greatest engineers, architect, scientist sculptor and painter of his and our time.
Catherine is a new artist. She uses water paints. She loves to do drawings of nature. Were she to draw the Mona Lisa, the Mona Lisa would be sitting the way she was in Leonardo's painting, but with a different background. Catherine's background would be dealing with nature. She would have Mona Lisa sitting near a pond.

Abdul - 11h Grade
The Mona Lisa is Leonardo's most famous work by far. The work is composed of a portrait of a woman with a smile that captures the spirit of anyone who has seen it. There is alot of controversy surrounding the work.
For instance, some critics have argued that the painting was a self-portrait of the famous artist Leonardo da Vinci as a female. Some have gone far enough to scan the face of the painting to his own picture and have discovered that the facial structures do match. I feel that this painting must of taken a lot of time and dedication to make a painting so mystifying, I also feel it is a painting that will enchant many others in the future.
Sanije - 10th Grade
One of the most celebrated portraits ever painted, the Mona Lisa is also known as La Gioconda after the presumed name of the woman's husband. Leonardo had a special affection for the picture, for he took it with him on all of his subsequent travels.

Terema - 9th Grade

About 1478 Leonardo set up his own studio. He received a commission for an alterpiece, the Adoration of the Magi. The Magi was left unfinished. Leonardo often failed to finish a work because he would not accept established answers.
Leonardo's first Milanese painting is the alterpiece Virgin on the Rocks. It exists in two versions. The earlier one in Paris was done by Leonardo; the other in London is later and there is some question as to whether Leonardo participated in its execution.

Anadilia - 12th Grade
Leonardo's "Spirit of the Renaissance" was demonstrated very well in the following paintings: The Madonna on the Rocks (1483), Unidentified Musician (1490) and the Last Supper (1495-98).
What has given Mona Lisa its universal fame is that the woman shown could be happy or sad. It is a mystery and you can interpret it however you want. The original Mona Lisa is kept at the Louvre, in Paris, France, one of the world's greatest museums.

Kendu - 11th Grade
On May 2, 1519 Leonardo died at Cloux and was buried in the palace church, during the French Revolution, The church along with many National Monuments was destroyed and torn down. The whereabouts of Leonardo's remains is no longer known.
Leonardo's Legacy will forever be remembered. Only 17 paintings that barely survived can definately be a characteristic of da Vinci. He spent 12 years planning a statue of a Horse to be erected in honor of Francesca Sforza in bronze, but the bronze was used instead to build cannons.

Ilene - 11th Grade

Cites the following Internet Resources she used for her report:

www.monalisa-artmat.com/RealMona.htm
www.leonet.it/comuni/vincimus/inbiogra.html

Milka - 10th Grade

The Last Supper is a mural in the Monastery of Santa Maria Delle in Grazie, Milan. She used the following Web link to complete her report.

The Essential Guide to the History of Painting

Subject: Re: Leonardo My Hero
Date: Sun, 31 Oct 1999 14:57:19 -0800
From: myhero@myhero.com
(jeanne meyers)
To: sjfeld@erols.com
Dear Steve,
It was nice to meet you and I thank you for sending your students comments to MY HERO. Your groups comments are featured on MY HERO this week.
http://myhero.com/featured/index.html
the other reference for this page is http://myhero.com/guestbook/leonardoguest.asp
we link to your site from this page.
Next project would be to get a "Leonardo" Artist Hero web page and link to your site...maybe someone in your group would be interested.... see http://myhero.com/guest for the program.
We can give you a genius t shirt prize for this entry. They happen to have a Leonardo T shirt if you want to check out our t shirt prize sponsors page http://www.a1.com/shirt/genius.html
and select a t-shirt then email your size, choice of t shirt and a mailing address to:
myhero@myhero.com we will get you a t-shirt prize....
THANKS AGAIN,
Jeanne