Largest Leonardo da Vinci Exhibit at The Tech Museum in San Jose
The world premiere of the largest, most comprehensive exhibit of the art, science & engineering works of Leonardo da Vinci is at The Tech Museum for just 100 days.
Wait — make that 99 days!
24 Feet Tall on the Red Carpet
Last night the red carpet rolled for a lavish celebration hosted by Frank and Denise Quattrone, Tech President Peter Friess and The Tech Board. Check out behind the scenes photos here on our Flickr set. Friess told ValleyZen, “There are so many engineers in Silicon Valley, and inside the soul of every engineer is a little bit of Leonardo. He’s not a person — He’s a phenomenon.”
Donors and Valley celebs walked the red carpet —-flanked by a 24 foot tall model of the Sforza Horse with its mighty hooves crushing hundreds of fresh rose petals. This bronze sculpture was originally designed as a gift for Ludovico il Moro, the Duke of Milan as a monument to Francesco Sforza, his predecessor. Shipping it from Florence, Italy to San Jose, required two ocean containers.
The Brilliant Galluzzi…& Galileo’s Middle Finger
We sat and talked with the curator of LEONARDO: 500 Years into the Future, Prof. Paolo Galluzzi, the Director of the Institute and Museum of the History of Science (Istituto e Museo di Storia della Scienza) in Florence, a museum that includes Michelangelo’s Compass (Compasso detto dei Michelangelo), Galilelo’s Telescope Lens (Lente obiettiva di Galileo) and Galileo’s Finger (Dito Medio della Mano Destra di Galileo).
The Zen of Leonardo
Galluzzi shared high hopes for LEONARDO: 500 Years, an exhibit which was a blockbuster at the Tokyo National Museum last year. There over one million visitors flocked to that exhibit, entitled The Mind of Leonardo – The Universal Genius at Work. Galluzzi said that Leonardo was given a warm reception by the Japanese who were meticulous about translating his work from Italian into Japanese. This led into a fascinating discussion on the affinity between Zen aesthetics and Italian art and design. We will explore more in upcoming posts.
Acclaimed architect Stefano Gris, founder of GRIS Architecture, spoke about the pleasure of architecting this exhibit in a space that is so large and offers so many possibilities. Indeed the exhibit is over 30,000 sq ft with over 200 artifacts. Twenty Italian artisans were flown in to build it. This morning they departed for Florence.
Special Police for Uffizi Paintings
Tech President Peter Friess graciously gave ValleyZen a private tour of the two paintings on loan from the Uffizi Gallery. Two days ago, the paintings made a dramatic entry into the Tech with the San Jose Special Police Unit on hand. A swarm of police cars and a dozen armed gunmen escorted the paintings inside. All we can say is, that has to be the best use of the San Jose Special Police Unit ever. A great metaphor for how important it is to be guardians of great art, and to devote resources to protect that art. When Uffizi Director Antonio Paolucci took out a traditional level to ensure the paintings were hung straight, Peter did the Silicon Valley equivalent — whipping out his iPhone equipped with the iLevel app (which leverages the iPhone’s integrated accelerometers to function as a digital level for picture-aligning).
Vitruvian Man on Ice
The Quattrone family helpe to kick off an exhibit that shines a spotlight on the importance of our following in Leonardo’s footsteps to bridge science and art in Silicon Valley. Giant projections of Leonardo’s Vitruvian man lit up a fantastic horse sculpted in ice, and an endless table of Italian delicacies from baby panini to an assortment of imported formaggi, pasta, and gelati to fortify guests as they prepared to enter the 30,000 square feet of exhibit space. Tech staff were dressed in period costume to transport guests back and forward in time.
Responses from Guests
Pixar Director Jim Capobianco, winner of an Annie Award (animation’s highest award) noted how this exhibit might cure our cultural myopia:
“500 years ago Leonardo looked into the future. Today many of us are so weighed down with the Financial Crisis and the 24 news hour cycle, that we don’t look beyond. This exhibit forces us to look outside of ourselves into the future, and dream.”
Carl Guardino, President and CEO of the Silicon Valley Leadership Group said:
“This exhibit underscores the parallels between the Italian Renaissance and our own Renaissance happening in Silicon Valley today.”
Board Member James T. Ryder, Lockheed Martin Space Systems said:
“This exhibit shows us we cannot split technical thought from artistic feeling.”
SkinnySongs CEO Heidi Roizen, sartorially sharp in black, and a leftie like Leonardo shared some interesting theories with us about Leonardo’s penchant for writing backwards.
To Reserve Tickets, click here.
Though he rarely finished anything. Since I don’t claim to be Leonardo I’ll get it done. The film is called “Leonardo” and is about his dream of flight and creativity. It is 8 minutes long and done in hand drawn animation. You can see more about it at leoanimation.blogspot.com.
Just to expand on my quote: This exhibit is important because when you look at Leonardo not as the myth he has become but as a person who actually lived you see all that he accomplished in his life and it makes you wonder what you are doing with yours. When you realize he was able to do this around more hardship then we have to deal with it really puts it in perspective. He had to leave his home twice because of wars. And both times to save his life. The political situation was always shifting around in Italy at the time. He was always on the look out for a patron. He had to make his own paints, tools, and notebooks. In addition plagues, floods, earthquakes were some what common occurrences. I mean we really have no excuses not to do something a tenth as extraordinary as Leonardo was able to do. Start by going to see the exhibit!