Leonardo Da Vinci

Leonardo Da Vinci is Walter Isaacson’s account of the life of one of the most brilliant artists, thinkers, and innovators who ever lived.

Saying Leonardo Da Vinci is one of the few people who still deserves the label ‘genius’ in today’s world is obviously a mouthful. However, in no way does it indicate he didn’t work hard to sharpen his talents. At age 14, he started an apprenticeship under a man named Andrea del Verrocchio, who was an artist and an engineer. This alone has several interesting implications.

First, back in the 15th century, art and engineering went hand in hand. Science was meant to be approached creatively and in turn, the principles of science, like the study of human vision and geometric forms, found its way into paintings and sculptures.

Second, just like you might hire a gardener or carpenter today, people used to order hand-crafted art on commission. Someone could walk into del Verrochio’s workshop any day of the week and pay him to make a custom statue of Hercules, for example.

Third, because of the commission payment model, it was easier for artists to make a living. Today, how much you earn as an artist is mostly based on fame. Companies like Medium and Patreon are trying to change that. That said, it also meant that art was treated like a commodity.

It was only when Leonardo reached fame and fortune, and was hired by kings to do his work, that the reputation of artists all around was elevated. Finally, painters and sculptors were respected for their creativity, more thought was given to their work, and innovative breakthroughs from individuals could reach the masses.

What’s most remarkable about Da Vinci is that he fundamentally changed our thinking in not just one, specific area, but across a range of disciplines: painting, sculpturing, frescoes, biology, anatomy, medicine, engineering, architecture, and a lot more. To use a modern term, he was an expert generalist. He illustrated math problems with artistic sketches, made sculptures of wax from human body parts, to understand how they work, and studied the human eye to improve how we perceive his paintings. However, in today’s world, where all these different fields have advanced so far already, we’re discouraged from being good at a lot of things and instead told to specialize and become great at one thing. For some, this is easy, but for people with many interests, like me, it feels like a curse. But our obsession with experts is not just frustrating, it may also be wrong. Imagine what happened if all of the brightest people were stuck in one, narrow topic, or channel of thinking. We’d constantly fail to see the big picture…