Leonardo da Vinci, and Images of Human Body and Anatomy in The Time of Renaissance

Haoshin Chang 28.1.2014

Art is conceived nowadays as a cultural practice to represent the structure and phenomenon of the world in the contemporary time, as well as a reflection of the artist and the world of art. But among the list, some of the individuals, with their distinctive or uncommon practices and productions, either spontaneously or out of any perceivable intention, are seen as not only contributing to the art realm, but affecting back on to the very field which is displayed in the work. In the discussion of intersections between art and science throughout the history of art, Leonardo da Vinci is one of the all-time exemplifications of two different interests approached seamlessly in convergence into one output that could be reviewed separately, but revealing his true novelty only when it is understood from an ever existed viewpoint. This well celebrated story of his achievements in the incredible details and preciseness of his illustrations on anatomies of human as well as animal body parts, in the spectacle of artists genuity, has hindered the less known cultural-historical background and aesthetic pursue that constructed the sociological circumstances under which the painters and sculptors were working. The essay seeks to present a generalized image of the society in which the artists are niched in different communities, the transformation of the images of body in the cultural territory from medieval times to the late Renaissance, and a comparison of the works of Leonardo da Vinci, which were developed with distinctively different styles based on the prerequisites that he had realized and approached with than his contemporary colleagues. The illustrations of human body, as well as the illustrations related to anatomical studies is said to be dated as far back as the Hellenic era, in which Aristotles De generatione animalium, speaks of the pedagogical in anatomy through paradigms, schemata, and diagram[1]. The method of teaching anatomy with visual representations continued being employed in the Alexanderian period by anatomist and physicians like Erasistratus and Herophilus[1], plausibly with the Five Picture Series, coined by Karl Sudhoff[1] to describe a type of crude illustration of human figure with anatomical geography of neural, circulative, and myological systems. This illustration passed on several changes without any major changes, while the translations of anatomical texts from Arabic region have been increasing through the time[1]. Until the medieval ages, the figures had only few associations to the

function of representing the literal material of anatomy, and have been seen as a symbolic decoration[1], or even in the eyes of physicians in the academy, to distract the reader from the text, which had actually little profit without the aid of images[1]. The development of anatomical illustrations was further dragged down by the abolishment of human dissection by the church[1], and education of anatomy could only be managed with animal dissection performed by the assistants[1]. The traditional five picture series was eventually substituted by the miniature of dissection scenes in the medical academic circle[1], but still an informative device for the uneducated barber-surgeon for their common practices like bloodletting. What could be recognized as the emergence of Renaissance spirit was the forming of the social network between the artists and the anatomists and the permission of dissection on cadavers body granted by the University statute[1]. From a refined and integrated perspective based on E. C. Streeter and F. H. Garrisons theories, the artists had initially acquainted the physicians at the apothecary shops while they were buying their pigments[1]. The power of the church was deeply distributed in the cultural territory in the late medieval times. Visual arts in this aspect were representing the blessing and divinity in the world through representations by painting, sculpture or architecture. To produce a portray that is closer to the naturalistic rendering was the aesthetic revolution for artists of renaissance[1][2], for God created all the things in order as designed for man to measure and understand disclose the divine architecture that stood at the summit of Gods creation becomes the central goal of anatomical representation[2]. In order to reach this artistic as well theological purpose, it is necessary to acquire a mastery of the body as a functional system of motion and emotion...included not only the muscular and skeletal mechanisms, but also those aspects of the human constitution that resulted in the outer signs of character and emotional expression, and to know thyself stands amongst all the programmes of visual measurement [2]. Some artists, like Masaccio, thus joined the guild as an apothecary and assisted his colleagues in dissections to get more understanding of human body, but still keeping his membership as a painter and remained in such ambiguity in the society[1][3]. Even a few of the artists had established close friendships with the anatomists, there were still fundamental differences in their approaches: The focus for the artists was a detailed observation of superficial structures, surface blood vessels, muscles contours and tendons to draw correct representations, which can be achieved by either examining live bodies or the deceased ones, or by flaying any mammals and translocate on to humans anatomical illustrations[1][2]; Among the anatomists and physicians, seeking to understand the deeper parts to relate them to the rest of

human structure to form up a systematized picture of the body were the priority[1]. Even though most artists didnt realize the distance between their approaches than the anatomists and sometimes entitle themselves as artist-anatomists, human body in the realm of renaissance art and humanistic science, through different discourses and methodologies, investigates the ultimate design of the holy entity. What had made da Vince to be recognized as the Renaissance man, comparing to his contemporary painters, was that he understood anatomy in a more literal sense and applies it in dissection of both human and non-human species, and thought that painting were a separate discipline[1]. In his notes with illustrations it is exemplary that he had achieved to integrates the text and the illustrations, a mode which had been adapted by the medical academies for anatomically correct and naturalistic illustrations carefully related to the text (that) became an importatnt adjunct to the further advance of anatomical studies[1]. Despite confusions and difficulties in the terminology, the disorganized chronological order in his footnotes, or the incompleteness and misarticulation in some of his studies, like relying on traditional Five Picture Series to represent the myological structure in abdominen parts of human body, Leonardo is still understood as the unified personality and historical phenomenon that "represents the greatest heights reached by the artist-anatomist"[1].

References: [1] da V. Leonardo, Leonardo on the Human Body (Dover Fine Art, History of Art), Second Edi. New York, New York, USA: Dover Publications, 1983, p. 506. M. Kemp, M. Wallace, S. Ballard, and I. Design, Spectacular Bodies: The Art and Science of the Human Body from Leonardo to Now. University of California Press, 2000, p. 224. M. Clayton, Leonardo da Vinci: The Divine and the Grotesque. Royal Collection Enterprises Ltd, 2006, p. 192.

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