Although Leonardo da Vinci was one of the greatest artists who ever
lived, his career was marked by an unusually large number of uncompleted
projects and by finished works that rapidly deteriorated. Nevertheless,
his influence is undoubted, and his claim to greatness rests chiefly on
his drawings, which have been carefully preserved in such locations as
Windsor Castle, the Louvre, the Uffizi Gallery, and the British
Museum.
This collection, excellently reproduced in black-and-white, is
representative of Leonardo's various achievements in many drawing media.
Among the selections are drawings of plants, landscapes, animals,
battles, weapons, and the human face and figure, as well as studies for
later paintings or sculpture: a full compositional study for The
Adoration of the Magi, a study for the angel's head in The Virgin of
the Rocks, studies of horses for the Sforza monument, studies for The
Last Supper, studies for The Battle of Anghiari, and an early cartoon
for The Madonna with St. Anne.