Da Vinci on show

A touring exhibition called “The Genius and his Machines” has arrived in Rome. The show presents a selection of Leonardo Da Vinci’s wooden machines, built from his designs. They are full-sized, fully-functional and visitors are encouraged to play with them. The show is interactive and is predictably popular with schools.

The machines on display include a plane, a glider, a helicopter, a wooden parachute, a bicycle, a hydraulic saw, and many others. The exhibition runs until the end of next April.

Meanwhile in France at the Chateau du Clos Luce in the Loire, they are also exhibiting a selection of Da Vinci’s work. Leonardo Da Vinci spent the last three years of his life here designing palaces and canals, organising royal festivities and sketching animals and plants.

The star exhibit however, is one of Da Vinci’s most beautiful creations. A full-sized mechanical walking lion made out of wood. It was reconstructed using witness accounts from the time, along with Da Vinci’s original sketches for the animal, and mechanisms that Da Vinci had invented: pulleys, weights and springs. The exhibition runs until the end of January.

For more information about the French exhibition see:
http://www.vinci-closluce.com/index.asp?lg=en

For more information about the exhibition in Rome see:
http://www.davincithegenius.com/index.php

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tags: Art, Exhibition, Italy