LEONARDO DA VINCI by WALTER ISAACSON
페이지가 엄청나서 부담이 있는건 사실이지만 책에 삽입된 다양한 그림들을 보면서 읽으면 의외로 도전할만한 책인거 같다는 생각도 들것이다. 비유가 적절한지는 모르겠지만 전체적으로 영자신문정도 읽는 느낌의 수준이다. 다만 독자에 따라서 책에 등장하는 작품들이나 다양한 이론들이 어렵게 느껴질 수 있지만 이해하기 힘든 부분들은 자료 사진들을 참고하면 어느 정도 도움을 받을 수 있을 것이다. 이 책은 피상적이고 막연하게 알고 있었던 "LEONARDO DA VINCI"의 삶과 작품세계에 대해서 정말 자세히 알 수 있는 기회를 준다. 그래서 새로운 정보에 놀라기도 하고 자세한 설명에 읽다가 지치기(?)도 했다. 하지만 책의 구성이 읽고 정리하기에 잘되어 있어서 끝까지 읽는데 도움이 되었다(힘들게 노력해서). 내용이나 문장의 표현등이 어려운 것만 있지는 않기 때문에 여유를 갖고 읽으면 영어공부에도 도움이 될 수 있다. 다만 개인적으로는 인내와 노력이 필요했다. 정보만을 얻고자 한다면 번역본도 좋을 듯 싶다.
".....ダビンチの裏面を如実に示している。惜しむらくはルイ１4世皇帝妃によって葬られた、禁断のLeda and the swan、見たかった。ダビンチが開発した遠近法、透視図法などの説明や、静止している絵画に動き、更には息吹きを吹き込む技法を分かり易く説明している ..." "What Isaacson wants to understand is what makes some men and women people of genius..." "Magnificent Biography of one of the worlds great innovators ...." "A brilliant portrayal of the process (and not the product); an inspiring invitation to invest in curiosity and observation" "Isaacson has focused on Leonardo's notebooks and he has traveled to all the archives where the originals are maintained ..." "...どのように研究しているか期待して見たが、まったく触れられてなくガッカリした .." "...いわば、ジャンル違いの科学者や文学者や芸術家たちが、互いに合い切磋琢磨しアイデアを融合させ、ひとつの物凄い作品をつくりあげてしまった ..."
- ... the archetype of the Renaissance Man, an inspiration to all who believe that the "infinite works of nature," as he put it, are woven together in a unity filed with marvelous patterns.
- Job said, " He saw beauty in both art and engineering, and his ability to combine them was what make him a genius."
- In fact, Leonardo's genius was a human one, wrought by his own will and ambition.
- His genius was of the type we can understand, even take lessons from. it was based on skills we can aspire to improve in ourselves, such as curiosity and intense observation.
- Vision without execution is hallucination.
- Skill without imagination is barren.
- My favorite gems in his notebooks are his to-do lists, which sparkle with his curiosity. one of them, dating from the 1490s in Milan, is that day's list of things he wants to learn.
- When I couldn't understand a math concept, I did the best I was able to visualize it. When I saw people at a supper, I studied the relationship of their motions to their emotions.
- I did learn from Leonardo how a desire to marvel about the world that we encounter each day can make each moment of our lives richer.
- Had he been a student at the outset of the twenty-first century, he may have been put on a pharmaceutical regimen to alleviate his mood swings and attention-deficit disorder.
- Intellectual passion drives out sensuality.
- Suddenly there arose in me two contrary emotions, fear and desire ........ Desire won ....
- While you are alone you are entirely your own master ....
- ..... the sad odyssey of a stone ....... "This is what happens to those who leave a life of solitary contemplation and choose to come to dwell in cities among people full of infinite evil."
- Renaissance humanism that put its faith in the dignity of the individual and in the aspiration to find happiness on this earth through knowledge.
- Math was nature's brushstroke.
- This use of sfumato, the smokiness that blurs sharp contours, was by now a hallmark of Leonardo's art.
- He never finished any of the works he began because, so sublime was his idea of art, he saw faults even in the things that to others seemed miracles.
- There was another reason, one even more fundamental, that Leonardo did not complete the painting : he preferred the conception to the execution.
- Portraying the "motions of the mind" was not a new concept. Pliny the Elder complimented the fourth-century BC painter Aristides of Thebes by saying he was "the first to express the mentality, sentiments, character, and passions of a subject."
- By the end of his career, his pursuit of how the brain and nerves turned emotions into motions became almost obsessive. It was enough to make the MONA LISA smile.
- Leonardo ....... his notebooks are filled with sketches both innovative and fanciful. His creativity came from his combinatory imagination.
- He was so generous that he sheltered and fed all his friends, rich or poor ... He was not motivated by wealth or material possessions. In his notebooks, he decried "men who desire nothing but material riches and are absolutely devoid of the desire for wisdom, which is the sustenance and truly dependable wealth of the mind."
- Because of his love for animals, Leonardo was a vegetarian for much of his life ........ not kill a flea for any reason whatsoever," ... His rationale for avoiding meat derived from a morality based on science.
- Pleasure and Pain are represented as twins, "Leonardo wrote on the drawing, "because there never is one without the other."
- "Medicine, when properly used, restore health to invalids, and a doctor will make the right use of them if he understands the nature of man," he wrote. "This too is what the sick cathedral needs - it needs a doctor-architect, who understands the nature of the building and the laws on which correct construction is based."
- Vitruvious's belief that the proportions of man are analogous to those of a well-conceived temple - and to the macrocosm of the world - became central to Leonardo's worldview.
- Leonardo's VITRUVIAN MAN embodies a moment when art and science combined to allow mortal minds to probe timeless questions about who we are and how we fit into the grand order of the universe. It also symbolizes and rational agency of humans as individuals.
- Throughout his life, he would repeat this claim to prefer experience over received scholarship.
- Leonardo broke with this tradition by basing his science primarily on observaations, then discerning patterns, and then testing their validity through more observations and experiments.
- "Galileo, born 112 years after Leonardo, is usually credited with being the first to develop this kind of rigorous empirical approach and is often hailed as the father of modern science," the historian Fritjof Capra wrote. "There can be no doubt that this honor would have been bestowed on Leonardo da Vinci had he published his scientific writings .....
- Guided by this analogy, Leonardo in his art sought to freexe-frame an event while also showing it in motion.
- Leonardo's insights were a precursor to what Newton, two hundred years later, would make his first law of motion unless acted upon by another force.
- Leonardo was also the first person to record the best mix of metals to produce an alloy that reduces friction.
- Leonardo increasingly came to realize that mathematics was the key to turning observations into theories.
- Leonardo became the first person to discover the center of gravity of a triangular pyramid ....
- Throughout his life, Leonardo would remain enchanted by the transformation of shapes.
- Leonardo wove an argument that was integral to understanding his genius : that true creativity involves the ability to combine observation with imagination, thereby blurring the border between reality and fantasy.
- This understanding of the relationship between shadows and color tones created a unified coherence to his art.
- Leonardo's optics ---------------------- on perspective.
- The Last Supper, both in its creation --------------- too innovative in its methods ........
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Conclusion
- The most obvious evidence that he was human rather than superhuman is the trail of projects he left unfinished ... the things he did finish were enough to prove his genius. The MONA LISA alone does that, as do all of his art masterpieces as well as his anatomical drawings.
- He enjoyed the challenge of conception more than the chore of completion.
- What made Leonardo a genius, what set him apart from people who are merely extraordinarily smart, was creativity, the ability to apply imagination to intellect ...
- The German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer wrote, "Talent hits a target that no one else can hit, Genious hits a target no one else can see .. Because they "think different," ......
- Be curious, relentlessly curious.
- Seek knowledge for its own sake.
- Retain a childlike sense of wonder.
- Observe.
- Start with the details.
- See things unseen
- Go down rabbit holes.
- Get distracted.
- Respect facts.
- Procrastinate.
- Let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
- Think visually.
- Avoid silos ; Jobs displayed a slide of a sign that showed the intersection of "Liberal Arts" and "Technology" streets. He knew that at such crossroads lay creativity.
- Let your reach exceed your grasp.
- Imagine fantasy.
- Create for yourself, not just for patrons.
- Collaborate.
- Make lists.
- Take notes, on paper.
- Be open to mystery.
