Leonardo da Vinci Vitruvian Man. Leonardo da Vinci

Leonard Da Vinci's Vitruvian Man is an amazing drawing known all over the world.

Painted by a famous thinker and activist of his time, it still raises many debates and questions.

Scientists have been looking at it from different angles for many years, trying to understand and delve into the sketch, but it is still believed that not all of its features have been found and, moreover, not all of its secrets have been solved.

History of origin

The famous sketch was born back in 1492. Few people know, but the Vitruvian Man is an illustration of the famous handwritten work of the no less famous architect Vitruvius, but was intended for Da Vinci’s diary, called the “Canon of Proportions.”

The pencil sketch is a successful attempt to convey the truths of the great architect. Vitruvius compared the proportions of the human body with the architecture of buildings; he was sure that the proportions of the human body were constant and easy to calculate. It was thanks to his work and Da Vinci's illustration that the proportionality scale was invented.

Today the drawing is kept in the Venice Museum. Exhibited as a unique exhibit very rarely (once every six months). It has the greatest historical value, for this reason the rest of the time only a narrow circle of scientists can see it.

Peculiarities

Why is the Vitruvian Man so interesting? There are many drawings drawn famous personalities, including many other works by Leonardo Da Vinci, so why is this one so popular? Everything is quite simple - his fame is directly related to his mystery. Leonardo believed in the unique number “phi” through which everything in nature is created.

Throughout his life he tried to apply or use this proportion in architecture. Vitruvian Man was created according to all the canons of the number “phi” - this is an ideal creature. The drawing shows a naked man with ideal body proportions in two different positions superimposed on each other.

A person is inscribed simultaneously in a circle and a square. A figure with legs together and arms apart stands in a square, and with arms and legs spread apart - in a circle. The centers of different geometric shapes are different points of the human body. In the case of a circle, this is the navel, and in the case of a square, the genitals.

To some extent, the problem of solving the sketch is that it can be viewed from different angles: spiritual, mathematical, philosophical, symbolic, and so on. In every special case There are new features that excite the minds of modern scientists.

• Often a drawing is used as a kind of canon of internal and external symmetry in various sciences: mathematics, symbolism, teachings about the Universe and creation;
• Sketch, unlike many famous works the author was made personally for Leonardo, and not for show. It was kept in his diaries and used for his own research;
• Today, the work causes a lot of controversy, primarily because of Giacomo Andrea de Ferrar. Many believe that Leonardo's drawing is only a copy of Giacomo, others are sure that the sketch was drawn by both of them;
• Hidden meaning Scientists see the sketch not only in a person, but also in a circle and a square, but they have not yet been able to unravel it;
• There are not two human poses in the drawing, but 16, although at first glance you cannot tell;
• Whether there was a model from which Leonardo or the Vitruvian Man drew is a fantasy still unknown. The only consensus remains that the image conveys the ideal of the human body and proportions from the author’s point of view.

Leonardo da Vinci

Vitruvian Man

Golden ratio in art

There is an opinion that a true creator does not create art himself, but allows God or energy (as he likes) to direct the brush, merging into a single whole and completely turning into the mystery of creativity.

Little is known about Leonardo da Vinci as a person. There is much more information about him as a mystic capable of unification with the whole. His creations in various fields of knowledge and art say more about him than he himself or anyone who knew him well could tell. The materials of his works that have reached us testify to his disclosure of the fundamental principles of beauty.

The Vitruvian Man is an illustration of the works of the ancient Roman architect Vitruvius, made by Leonardo da Vinci around 1490-92 in his journal, along with explanations. The drawing depicts the figure of a naked man in two superimposed poses with arms and legs spread to the sides, inscribed in a circle and a square.

Combinations of arms and legs make up four poses. A pose with arms spread to the sides in two positions and legs not spread fits into a square, the so-called “Square of the Ancients.” Two more poses with arms and legs spread out to the sides, fit into a circle. The center of the figure always remains motionless.

“Vetruvio architetto mette nelle sue opera d’architettura che le misure dell’omo...”“The architect Vetruvius laid down the dimensions of man in his architecture...”

Leonardo da Vinci's accompanying notes explain that the drawing was created by him to study the proportions of the human body, as described in the treatises of the ancient Roman architect Vitruvius, who wrote the following about the human body:

“Nature has ordained the following proportions in the structure of the human body:
the length of four fingers is equal to the length of the palm,
four palms are equal to a foot,
six palms make one cubit,
four cubits is the height of a person.
Four cubits are equal to a step, and twenty-four palms are equal to the height of a person.
If you spread your legs so that the distance between them is 1/14 of a person's height, and raise your arms so that your middle fingers are level with the top of your head, then the center point of your body, equidistant from all limbs, will be your navel.
The space between your spread legs and the floor forms an equilateral triangle.
The length of your outstretched arms will be equal to your height.
The distance from the roots of the hair to the tip of the chin is equal to one tenth of human height.
The distance from the top of the chest to the top of the head is 1/6 of the height.
The distance from the upper part of the chest to the roots of the hair is 1/7.
The distance from the nipples to the top of the head is exactly a quarter of the height.
The greatest width of the shoulders is an eighth of height.
The distance from the elbow to the fingertips is 1/5 of the height, from the elbow to the armpit is 1/8.
The length of the entire arm is 1/10 of the height.
The beginning of the genitals is located right in the middle of the body.
The foot is 1/7 of the height.
The distance from the toe of the foot to the kneecap is equal to a quarter of the height, and the distance from the kneecap to the beginning of the genitals is also equal to a quarter of the height.
The distance from the tip of the chin to the nose and from the roots of the hair to the eyebrows will be the same and, like the length of the ear, equal to 1/3 of the face.”

Meaning of the Vitruvian Man

“Everything new is well-forgotten old,” says famous saying. The “resurrection” from antiquity of the mathematical proportions of the human body, made by Leonardo da Vinci in the 15th century, became the foundation of the great achievements that preceded Italian Renaissance. The Vitruvian Man itself is a symbol of the internal symmetry and natural harmony of the human body.

Any divine manifestation, including art, is inherent in the desire for harmony, proportionality, harmony - for such a harmonious state of being, which we are accustomed to calling beauty. Being ourselves a part of the universal energy of beauty, we unmistakably distinguish one from the other. The ugly immediately catches the eye.

We find beauty in the proportions of architecture and sculpture, in the arrangement of surrounding objects and forms, in the combination of colors in paintings, in the alternation of rhymes and rhythmic dimensions in poetry, in the combinations, sequences and gravity of musical sounds.

In nature and the human body there are many proportional harmonious relationships, close to the golden ratio of Leonardo da Vinci. However, golden ratio not the only attitude that is visually perceived as beautiful. These include ratios such as 1:2, 1:3. They are also close to the golden ratio.

In any work of art, several unequal parts, but close to the golden ratio, give the impression of the development of forms, their dynamics, and proportional complement to each other. This property is used everywhere and has long been called “canonical proportions.”

Every person is able to distinguish the beautiful from the ugly. For example, if he sees a house or some other structure that is not maintained in the proportions of the golden ratio, then it immediately becomes obvious that “something is wrong with it.” Something is confusing. This landmark of harmony and a sense of beauty is in everyone.

“All art strives to become music.” (Walter Pater)

“The greatness of art is most clearly manifested in music.” (Johann Wolfgang Goethe)

How to determine the presence of the golden ratio in something that does not have material forms, in such a way as music? How to "measure" musical composition by beauty?

In music, the golden ratio reflects the features human perception time proportions. The golden ratio point serves as a reference point for the duration of the work and often marks the climax. Or it could be the most bright accent or the quietest “kachum”, the densest and most instrumentally rich sounding place or the highest pitch, or the place where the crescendo ends, a change of rhythm.

It often happens that a new musical theme appears at the golden ratio point.

And as Frank Zappa said: “Talking about music is like dancing about architecture.”

Listen...

Listen to the good one beautiful music and realize your beauty. Let the music reflect the beauty of the golden ratio of your being. Let there be goosebumps!

Where music begins, thoughts disappear, an observer and awareness of beauty appears (unless, of course, you listen to music and do not use it as white noise in the background).

And the next time you listen to music, pay attention to what you are doing: listening or thinking. Just think about Leonardo.

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“Vitruvian Man” is the name given to Leonardo da Vinci’s well-known illustration for a book about the ancient Roman architect Vitruvius. The picture was posted in the author's diary and contained a double image of a naked man. The figures are superimposed on each other, but differ in the position of the arms and legs. Leonardo accompanied the image of the Vitruvian Man detailed description. The picture is now kept in a gallery in Florence and is considered an example of “canonical proportions.”

Question of authorship

One of the main mysteries of the legendary Vitruvian Man is the question of who actually created him. In 2012, statements emerged that the illustration was not painted by Leonardo. The supposed author of the famous image may be his friend, the talented architect Giacomo Andrea de Ferrara. Just in the 90s of the 15th century - the time of the creation of the Vitruvian Man - he worked on the topic of proportions.
Claudio Sgarbi, an architectural historian from Italy, is sure that it was Giacomo who drew the illustration. Leonardo could have become interested in his work, and then made his own edits to it, or simply redrawn the man, improving his contours. What actually happened in the distant 15th century has not yet been established precisely.

Who was the model

There are no surviving descriptions of the model from which the Vitruvian Man may have been drawn. There is also no evidence that during this period of time Leonardo painted an image of a naked man from someone. Perhaps the model was the author himself.
Leonardo could paint himself in rare moments of leisure. The process of displaying his own naked body on paper was not publicly displayed by the master, so there were no witnesses to his work on the Vitruvian Man. Art critics believe that Leonardo embellished reality a little for the glory of pure science. After all, his task was to create an Ideal, not to reflect reality.

What do circle and square mean?

The most controversial question is why the author included the Vitruvian Man in the indicated geometric figures. In Leonardo's diary there is an entry that a man ancient world was a microcosm, a “world in miniature.”
The circle and square, as basic figures of geometry, reflect the patterns existing in the Universe. It was quite natural for the artist to want to calculate the proportions of the ideal human body using the mathematical laws of the aspect ratio of these figures.

Unsolved cipher

Leonardo is well known for his love of riddles and codes. Modern scientists and art historians believe that the creation of the Vitruvian Man was also not without secret signs. The most obvious is the five-pointed star, which is represented by the figure of a man. The "rays" are the character's head, arms and legs.
The 5-pointed star, or pentacle, was considered a protective amulet in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. The same figure with a person inscribed in it back in Ancient Rome symbolized the god Mars. A similar image can be found in the work of the German scientist Agrippa of Nettesheim (“Agrippa’s Pentagrammaton”).
Some ordinary people mistakenly believe that the star hidden in the figure of the Vitruvian Man indicates the artist’s interest in the occult sciences. In fact, Satanists use an inverted star, the seal of the goat-like idol Baphomet, in their rituals. But this symbol is hardly related to Leonardo’s work on studying the structure of the human body.

Vitruvian Man - Leonardo da Vinci. Drawings with pen, watercolor and metal pencil in the master's diaries. 1490. 34.3 x 24.5 cm

"The Vitruvian Man" is also a masterpiece visual arts and the fruit of scientific research. This drawing was created as an illustration for Leonardo’s book dedicated to one of the works of Vitruvius, the famous Roman architect. Like Leonardo himself, Vitruvius was an extraordinarily gifted man with broad interests. He knew mechanics well and had encyclopedic knowledge. Leonardo's interest in this extraordinary man is understandable, since he himself was a very versatile person and was interested not only in art in its various manifestations, but also in science.

"The Vitruvian Man" is a witty and innovative way for its time to demonstrate perfect proportions human figure. The drawing depicts the figure of a man in two positions. In this case, the outlines of the images are superimposed on each other and inscribed, respectively, in a square and a circle. Both geometric figures have common points of contact. This image shows what they should be like correct proportions the body of a man according to the description left by Vitruvius in his book “On Architecture”. In a broad sense, the concept of architecture can also be applied to the principles of the structure of the human body, as Leonardo da Vinci successfully demonstrated.

The role of the “Vitruvian Man” in the development of art and the flowering of the Italian Renaissance is extremely great. After the fall of the Roman Empire, much knowledge of previous generations about human proportions and body structure was lost and gradually forgotten. In medieval art, images of people were sharply different from those in antiquity. Leonardo was able to demonstrate how the divine plan is actually reflected in the structure of the human body. His drawing became a model for artists of all times. Even the great Le Corbusier used it to create his own creations, which influenced the architecture of the entire 20th century. Due to the symbolism of the image, many consider it to be a reflection of the structure of the entire universe (the figure’s navel is the center of the circle, which evokes associations with the center of the Universe).

In addition to its enormous historical and scientific significance, “Vitruvian Man” also carries significant aesthetic significance. The drawing is made with thin, precise lines that perfectly convey human forms. The image created by Leonardo is very expressive and memorable. Hardly to be found civilized man, who has not seen this image and does not know its author.

Leonardo da Vinci
Vitruvian Man, Study of proportions, from Vitruvius's De Architectura
approximately 1490-1492
Brown ink, metal pencil, feather
34.3 x 24.5 cm (13.50 x 9.65)
Academic Gallery, Venice, Italy
Venice Gallerie dell'Accademie

Vitruvian Man- drawing made Leonardo Da Vinci around 1490-92, as an illustration for a book dedicated to the works Mark of Vitruvius. The drawing is accompanied by explanatory inscriptions, in one of his journals.. It depicts the figure of a naked man in two superimposed positions: with his arms spread to the sides, describing a circle and a square.

The drawing and text are sometimes called canonical proportions.

When examining the drawing, you will notice that the combination of arms and legs actually makes up four different poses. A pose with arms spread to the sides and legs not spread fits into a square (“Square of the Ancients”).

On the other hand, a pose with arms and legs spread out to the sides fits into a circle. And, although, when changing poses, it seems that the center of the figure is moving, in fact, the navel of the figure, which is its real center, remains motionless.

Subsequently, using the same method, Corbusier compiled his proportionation scale, which influenced the aesthetics of 20th-century architecture.

Text in the picture:

“Vetruvio architetto mette nelle sue opera d’architettura che le misure dell’omo...” “The architect Vitruvius laid down the dimensions of man in his architecture...”

In his accompanying notes, Leonardo da Vinci indicated that the drawing was created to study the proportions of the (male) human body, as described in the treatises of the ancient Roman architect Vitruvius, who wrote the following about the human body:

Nature has ordained the following proportions in the structure of the human body:

Four finger length equal to the length of the palm,
Four palms equal to the foot,
Six palms make up one cubit,
Four cubits- man's height.
Four cubits equal to the step, and twenty four palms equal to human height.
If you spread your legs so that the distance between them is 1/14 of a person's height, and raise your arms so that your middle fingers are level with the top of your head, then the center point of your body, equidistant from all limbs, will be your navel.

The space between your spread legs and the floor forms an equilateral triangle.

Arm length will be equal to growth.
Distance from hair roots to tip of chin equal to one tenth of human height.
Distance from upper chest to crown is 1/6 of growth.
The distance from the top of the chest to the roots of the hair - 1/7.
Distance from nipples to crown is exactly a quarter of the growth.
Largest shoulder width- an eighth of growth.
Distance from elbow to fingertips- 1/5 of height, from elbow to armpit - 1/8.
Whole arm length- this is 1/10 growth.
The beginning of the genitals is located right in the middle of the body.
Foot- 1/7th of the growth.
Distance from toe to kneecap equal to a quarter of height, and distance from the kneecap to the beginning of the genitals also equal to a quarter of the height.
Distance from tip of chin to nose And from hair roots to eyebrows will be the same and, like the length of the ear, equal to 1/3 of the face.