leonardo da vinci paintings
Leonardo painted this picture in the full maturity of his talent, and, although it is now little more than a monochrome owing to the free and merciless restoration to which it has been at times subjected, it must have created a wonderful impression on those who saw it in the early years of the sixteenth century. It is difficult for the unpractised eye to-day to form any idea of its original beauty. Leonardo has here painted this worldly-minded woman–her portrait is much more famous than she herself ever was–with a marvellous charm and suavity, a finesse of expression never reached before and hardly ever equalled since. Contrast the head of the Christ at Milan, Leonardo’s conception of divinity expressed in perfect humanity, with the subtle and sphinx-like smile of this languorous creature.
Leonardo Da Vinci is a painter, sculptor, draughtsman, architect, engineer, anatomist, physicist, astronomer, observer of life in all its forms, and most of all, great thinker.