Arno

The Landscape of The Arno Valley,

One can say Leonardo's painting practices followed his stated theories. His earliest dated drawing, a pen
and ink landscape of the Arno Valley, drawn when he was twenty one years of age, is an optical illusion
with images of detailed, enchanting animals and human figures, one depicting the love between a man
and a woman drawn from his imagination, all interwoven and fused together with the environmental
elements of the Arno Valley.

During the Italian Renaissance, landscape was not a universally admired element of painting.
Despite the fact that many of his contemporaries thought of landscapes as painting without reason. In
his manuscripts, Leonardo presented a theoretical basis for the acceptance of landscapes as an
independent branch of painting. Michelangelo and Botticelli for instance believed that the study of
natural scenery was a waste of time, Leonardo however, did not share their opinion and stated that:

From the book,"Mona Lisa, The Picture and Myth," Author Roy Mc Mullen, page 89, Chapter 7
Quote by Leonardo.
“If the painter wishes to bring forth sites or deserts cool and shady places in times of heart warm
spots when it is cold, he fashions them. So if he desires valleys or wishes to discover vast tracks of
land from mountain peaks and look at the sea on the distant horizon beyond them it is in his power....In
fact whatever exists in the universe either potentially or actually or in the imagination, he has it first in
his mind and then in his hands.”

Amid the shadows of the valleys and the mountains are images of a baby lion cub peering
precociously from beneath a cover of some kind, a tranquil donkey
calmly gazing over his shoulder, the bust of the feline beneath the waterfall, his attention focused
on an unknown object and a cat crouching above the waterfall. The cat was among Lionardo's
favorite animals, so much so that he devoted several entire pages in his notebooks to the study of cats,
their characteristics, behaviour, and various postures. Many of his drawings also show
children joyously holding, hugging and petting beloved felines.

The images below highlight the relationship between animals and people that captured Leonardo’s
interest and imagination, and the way in which he covertly placed many of those images in his
works.

The Landscape of the Arno Valley is a complex work full of multiple elements and interwoven
constructs that are still being discovered today.

Though one of his earliest works, The Arno Valley portrays the genius that was Leonardo, and the
man who would become the most celebrated artist and intellect in the history of art.