A new exhibition, "Da Vinci The Genius" which opened its doors to the public in March of 2012 at the "Vetoshny" exhibition center in Moscow is one of the most complete and uniquely created traveling exhibitions on Leonardo da Vinci in the world, showing the full range of his incredible talent as an inventor, artist, anatomist, sculptor, engineer, musician and architect.
The exhibition was created by Italian Association "Anthropos” in collaboration with «Grande Exhibitions» company. It took more than 10 years for Anthropos’ Modesto Veccia and his colleagues from Il Genio di Leonardo Da Vinci Museo in Rome to interpret and decode Da Vinci's diaries – the infamous Codices; tiny notebooks of categorized drawings and writings on a multitude of subjects. It is believed that they were written on at least 24,000 pages, only 6,000 of which survived with time. In these notebooks, he took notes and sketches on the geometry, engineering, fauna and flora, mathematics, physics and philosophy. He created incredibly detailed anatomical sketches and designed a highly innovative building design and mechanical devices, most of which were never materialized during his life.
Unraveling the mysteries of these codices and bringing to life the inventions, recreated in wood and metal was truly a great challenge that allows us all to join a unique travel through time.
This exhibition doesn’t consist of original artifacts; Leonardo never actually produced the majority of what he designed, what little remains has failed the test of time.
This exhibition provides a tangible and easy to understand exploration into the diversity of ideas that consumed arguably the greatest mind the world has ever known.
This exposition offers its viewers 65 of 120 recreated mechanisms, all built according to technology used in Italy of 15th century, with the use of authentic materials, including wood, cotton, copper, iron, canvas and ropes. Most of the models are made in full size.
On display, visitors can observe the first ever created car, submarine, tank, machine gun, a video camera, scuba, helicopter, etc., as well as reproductions of Da Vinci’s most famous paintings, including the "Mona Lisa", "Madonna of the rocks" and "Annunciatin", "Lady with an Ermine", amazing anatomical sketches, sketches for the "Battle of Anghiari" and a three-dimensional interactive performance of "The Last Supper", "Vitruvian Man" and the sculpture "Sforza Horse ".
One of the most interesting parts of exhibition is "Secrets of Mona Lisa" display. Its creator, French scientific engineer and photographer of fine art, Pascal Cotte was granted unprecedented access by the French Government and The Louvre Museum to conduct an extensive scientific evaluation of this masterpiece. He did so under strict security and supervision, taking her out of her frame and away from the protective glass enclosure. His photographic examination and findings have startled the art world – making 25 revelations including identifying her original pigment colors, proving she indeed did have eyebrows and eyelashes and producing the world’s only 360 ° walk around replica.
Da Vinci The Genius exhibition was created in order to pay tribute to the great works of Leonardo da Vinci and to collect them all in one place, so that everyone could visit and admire this brilliant and great mind. Perhaps Leonardo da Vinci is the greatest of all geniuses the world has known, and our exhibition clearly shows why such proposal is undeniable.
Mr. Bruce Peterson, founder and managing director of the company« Grande Exhibitions»
AUDIENCE:
The exhibition was held in Moscow for four months with over 80,000 visitors.
Target audience:
- Families with children;
- Junior and high school pupils;
- Students (arts and science departments);
- Socially active audience.
Please visit official web-sites of exhibition for more information:
