LEONARDO DA VINCI-Art & Science·Then & Now

The Leonardo da Vinci Exhibition
達文西展覽

City University of Hong Kong is proud to present 12 original drawings by Leonardo da Vinci from the Veneranda Biblioteca Ambrosiana, Milan, brought to Hong Kong for the first time to celebrate the 500th anniversary of the artist’s death. Leonardo was a scientist, painter, sculptor, architect, engineer, mathematician, and even musician, but he was first and foremost a polymath inventor and creator. Whether looking at plants, musical harmonies, or elliptical curves of cannon balls, Leonardo was fascinated by the world around him, and devoted his life to exploring and transcribing it. His indiscriminate love for and exploration of the diversity of human and natural knowledge—arts, humanities, sciences and technology—turned him into the exemplar of what is now called a Renaissance man.

The most prolific artist of his time, Leonardo left behind over 6,000 drawings that reveal his scientific, theoretical, and creative mental worlds. Though Leonardo was revered as a painter during his lifetime, these thousands of sheets remained largely unknown before the 19th century (only his unfinished “Treatise on Painting” was published). Since then, however, his writings, overflowing with artistic, scientific, and technological inventions, have become almost more famous than his artwork. They reveal a polymath whose prescient observations and scientific analyses seem to foreshadow later discoveries; one need only think of his flying machines, his perfect rendering of hydrodynamic water turbulence, and his industrial-age style machines (five models of which are also on display in the exhibition).

In tribute to Leonardo’s continuing influence, nine contemporary artists (eight based in Hong Kong) produced new artworks imagining what Leonardo might have done in an era of digital media and virtual reality. Combining new and old media, the artists respond to his ideas on flight, movement, light, and the act of drawing itself. Fully embedded in contemporary technology, these pieces nonetheless hark back in startlingly direct ways to the legacies of Leonardo’s drawings, paintings, and unlimited curiosity. Please note: all the drawings in the Exhibition Catalogue, unless otherwise stated, are from the Biblioteca and Pinacoteca Ambrosiana, Milan.

為紀念達文西逝世五百週年之際，香港城市大學獲米蘭昂布羅修圖書館借出12幅李奧納多．達文西的手繪真跡，並首度來港展出，實乃榮幸之至。

身為同時代最多產的藝術家，達文西留下超過6,000幅手繪，讓世人得以盡覽其科學與理論的卓有成就，窺見其匠心獨運的精神世界。儘管達文西生前被視為畫家，但這數千頁手稿直至19世紀才廣為人知（此前僅曾經發表其未竟之作《繪畫論》）。然而，自此之後，他那些在藝術、科學及技術等層面屢有創見的文章，甚至比其藝術創作更有名。大師的洞察力頗具先見之明，其科學研究彷彿預言了後世的發明；譬如飛行器、對水動力學渦流原理的精確描述，以及多款工業時代風的機械，其中五款的實物模型將於是次展覽展出。

為向達文西不息的影響力致敬，九位當代藝術家（當中八位駐居香港）特別創作新作，設想達文西若置身現代，面對數碼媒體與虛擬實境技術，將創造出何種作品。參展藝術家結合新舊媒介，回應達文西對於飛行、運動、光線以至繪畫此一實踐的見解。這些作品完全深入至現代科技中，同時直接呼應達文西的手繪、畫作等豐富的藝術遺產，與大師無盡的好奇心一脈相承。

請注意：展覽目錄中的所有繪圖，除非另有註明，均來自昂布羅修圖書館.