Leonardo Vinci (1452-1519) is considered the greatest polymath of the art and history of science. His inventions, works of art and studies, but also his mysterious life, deal with today science and literature.

The universal genius Leonardo da Vinci, epitome of the Renaissance man, was a painter, sculptor, architect, writer, theorist, naturalist, inventor and technician all in one. Although he had learned as an illegitimate child in the primary school barely read, write and count, he prevailed early thanks to his unique talent for training as a painter and sculptor in the workshop of Verrocchios, and soon tried to gain a position at one of the farms. Temporarily succeeded, for the Duke of Milan or for Cesare Borgia, to operate the Pope or the French King.

His life was filled with that humanistic view of humanity and universal knowledge and pressing urge, which was characteristic for its era. Constantly observing, registering, and analysing, he created alone as a scientist and engineer a huge factory. For example, he dealt with the geological information and the cloud formation, the flow of the water and the air, the bird's flight and apparatus, which should allow the flight of people.

His work as an artist is, however, less, but occupies the highest rank such as the "Last supper" and "Mona Lisa".

His artistic quest for compositions with moderate-quiet basic geometric shapes prepared the High Renaissance. His later approaches to regard the phenomenal world in their transformation by air and light, even have been expected on the Baroque painting.

An art work that is cut in from a stone or wooden surface, not modeled in the round.

According to the degree of projection one can distinguish between low-relief or bas-relief and high relief. The sunk relief is a common form of reliefs in Ancient Egypt, where the depicted scenes were cut into the stone or wood surface.

Among the most famous reliefs are the works of the Florentine master Lorenzo Ghiberti. He created, among others, the bronze doors of the Florence Baptistery, called by Michelangelo the "Gates of Paradise".