Da Vinci and Freud Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Da Vinci and Freud - Essay Example The notebooks that Da Vinci left behind disclose an exceptionally alert and incisive mind swimming with so many fantastical initiatives that it would have taken several lifetimes to bring just the realistic to fruition. As a result of what he did accomplish and the truly breathtaking scope of what he intended to accomplish, for most of his legacy Leonard Da Vinci has been relegated to that airy sphere of the genius, removed from the rabble of consistent mediocrity. For this reason, Da Vinci's image has tended to withstand contemporary assaults and interpretations through the ages. Safely removed to a period considered among the heights of human achievement, it has always been easier to simply dismiss any realistic examination into the psyche of his mind by explaining him inadequately away as a genius. The past century, however, has witness a revitalization of the image of Da Vinci that has gotten particularly vital in the past few decades. No longer content to explain away artistic prodigy with the lame excuse of genius, the critical investigation into what has made Da Vinci a titanic figure in history has come down to earth through careful examination of all extant material. Da Vinci's exertions on an assortment of subject matter have made its way across the world, found in museums on nearly every continent. It has even come to light that not everything that is found in the scribbles of those notebooks originated in the mind of Da Vinci himself; he possessed not just a creative mind, but an interpretive mind as well, adapting pre-existing ideas. This new information and the analysis of what had already been known have supplied an enhanced considerate for the process by which Leonardo benefited from the ideas presented by both his peers and predecessors. In this way, Leonardo has been lowered a little closer to earth, while still striding over most of us like an Olympus. Without doing anything to reduce his accomplishments, this new portrait of Da Vinci serves to reveal a figure that is somehow more human and even vulnerable. Yet, despite an artistic canon that is renowned for a massive fresco depicting the Last Supper of Jesus Christ, as well as countless portraits of the Madonna and baby Jesus, Leonardo Da Vinci's contemporary idealization is based upon the conception of the artist as a secular figure. Da Vinci, despite his clear talents as a traditional artist of Biblical images, is foremost grounded in the modern consciousness as a scientist who used his art as a device for peering into the clandestine world that lies hidden just behind the veil of knowledge. The great irony of Da Vinci's life may be that his fame rests greatly upon two of paintings that considered the ultimate Renaissance accomplishment of bringing to life the mysteries of the human soul while he was as a person actually rather disinterested in the affairs of men such as religion and politics. Clearly, Leonardo Da Vinci ranks as one of history's greatest intellectuals, despite his self-exile from much of the realm of society. Just as obvious from the sheer breadth of his accomplishments and the truly astounding range of his interests, Da Vinci suffered-or perhaps thrive would be apt-from conditions related to obsession. Intellectualization is a psychological term used to describe the endeavor of obsessive to sublimate uncomfortable emotional disorders through the