Publisher's description:
Leonardo da Vinci (15 April 1452 – 2 May 1519), is considered one of the greatest artists of all times. Regarded as a true "Renaissance Man", his wide scope of interests included invention, painting, sculpting, science, mathematics, engineering and botany. Born in a farmhouse in a village in Tuscany, he moved, at age five, to his father's family estate in the Tuscan town of Vinci, from where his surname derives. He received little formal education but began an apprenticeship at age 14 with the celebrated artist Andrea del Verrocchio in Florence.
His early life was spent working in the service of Ludovico il Moro in Milan but he later moved to Rome, Bologna and lived his last years in France at the home given to him by Francis I.
In 1503, he began working on  the 'Mona Lisa,' the most famous painting in the world, as a privately commissioned work. The painting was eventually acquired by King Francis I of France . Renowned  for the enigmatic smile of the woman in the portrait, the Mona Lisa is still veiled in mystery. Among his other celebrated works are 'The Last Supper' a late 15th-century mural painting and the most reproduced religious painting of all times, 'Virgin of the Rocks' London, oil on panel, painted for the chapel of the Confraternity of the Immaculate Conception, in the church of San Francesco Maggiore in Milan, Vitruvian Man, pen and ink on paper, the drawing is based on the correlations of ideal human proportions with geometry by the ancient Roman architect Vitruvius and da Vinci, Self Portrait in red chalk.