Horse of Léonard

The Horse of Léonard (in Italian: It Cavallo di Leonardo ) is a monument invented by Léonard de Vinci. It succeeds in finishing only one model in Argile. While taking as a starting point this project it was envisaged to create, as from the Seventies, two reproductions.

History

The original project

In 1482, Ludovic Sforza Duke of Milan, proposed in Léonard de Vinci to build largest equestrian Statue of the world: a monument with the glory of his/her father François I {{er}}, duke of 1452 with 1466 (year of its death), and founder of the house Sforza.

Léonard knew perfectly that the quality of the Cheval was very important to stress the importance of the character and thus studied much all the anatomical details of the animal, by carrying out preparatory projects by using as models some horses already famous for their beauty. The projects reproduced really the anatomical parts most beautiful of each horse. In the notes of Léonard de Vinci one finds remarks of the type: " Morel Fiorentino is large and has a beautiful neck… " , or " Ronzone is white, it has beautiful thighs and is with Porte Comasina ".

The intention of Léonard was thus to take " parties" various horses and to make an assembly of it to obtain the ideal horse in order to honor the character whom it was to represent.

Léonard, with this monument, wanted to carry out a work which would obscure all the preceding equestrian statues, in particular those of Verrocchio and Donatello, dedicated respectively to Bartolomeo Colleoni and Gattamelata. Léonard was interested, actually, more with the horse that with the Cavalier; its horse was to be tallest of all, to exceed the 7 m height and being posed on the posterior legs in a pulled up position, a challenge ever tried then. For that Léonard fills of the sheets and the sheets of sketch of anatomy, while passing much time to project and calculate this gigantic work that, for his fusion, it envisaged 100 well; tons of Bronze.

Meanwhile Ludovic Sforza started with impatienter and sought even others sculptors in Florence able to carry out this work in shorter times, but nobody presented himself. At a certain time, Léonard de Vinci was persuaded that the problems were too numerous to succeed in building a pulled up horse and was resigned to create a more traditional horse, but resting always only on two legs; a posterior leg and another former opposite.

Finally, after almost 16 years of studies, the construction of the model started and was finished at the time of the marriage of the niece of the duke with the emperor of Austria. This colossal statue was publicly exposed, and caused general admiration. Léonard built the moulds for fusion, all was thus ready for really carrying out work. Unfortunately, 100 tons of bronze necessary were not available any more, because they had been used to manufacture guns intended for the defense of the Duché of Este invaded by the French soldiers of the king Louis XII. The French arrival of the troops in Milan in 1499 caused important damage with the horse of Léonard. Indeed, the model was used as target for the principal rafters.

Actually, the most serious fact was that the moulds were lost; the model in Craie could even be sacrificed, but without mould work was definitively lost.

The Horse of Léonard 5 centuries later

In 1977 Charles Dent, a pilot American, collector of Art and impassioned Sculpture, is filled with enthusiasm with the idea to realize after 5 centuries the dream of Léonard. To set up the organization and to find the funds appeared a difficult company however who asked him more for 15 years. The cost of the horse, finally, arrived almost at 2,5 million dollars, but Charles Dent died in 1994 before succeeding in seeing his dream being carried out.

The project encountered many difficulties and finally the management works was entrusted to the sculptrice Nina Akamu which concluded the company.

The first stage was to carry out a horse with reduced dimensions, of approximately 3 m in height. This one made it possible to arrive at the gigantic clay sculpture of 8 m in height. The clay horse was used to create a mould out of chalk (or Cire for finer details) in which was cast molten bronze. Contrary to the project of Léonard, this horse was carried out in seven sections. At the 15th century, it was not possible to weld bronze.

The sections arrived in July 1999 at Milan where they were welded together. After some discussions the horse was posed in September 1999 at the entry of the Hippodrome of San Siro.

Counterpart

In Italy and in Milan, very few people know that there are two specimens of the Horse of Léonard, identical.

Indeed with died of Tooth the project was being abandoned, when Frederik Meijer, owner of a chain of supermarkets in the Michigan, offered to finance the project, provided that two horses are created: for Milan and the other for Meijer Gardens: a natural park and artistic with Large Rapids (Michigan), property of Meijer, where copies of the most famous modern statues are gathered.

The Horse of Léonard was placed in the park in October 1999 and is today more the exposed beautiful piece.

References

External bonds

satellite Localization of the '' Cheval of Milan '' on satellite WikiMapia
Localization of the '' Cheval of Large Rapids '' on WikiMapia
Leonardo da Vinci' S Horse

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