经济学人下载:艺术史:达·芬奇和我们(2)

Like many an autodidact, da Vinci was long on inquisitiveness but short on intellectual self-discipline. He had astonishing powers of observation, an extraordinary talent for making connections between different areas of knowledge, a readiness to challenge contemporary beliefs and an uncanny ability to anticipate future discoveries. But his life yielded an endless succession of untested contraptions, unpublished studies and unfinished artworks.
达·芬奇和许多自学成才的人一样，好奇心很强，但缺乏理智的自律。他观察力惊人，拥有在不同领域的知识之间建立联系的非凡天赋，随时准备挑战当代信仰，在预测未来发现方面能力非凡。他的一生创造出无数未经测试的新奇玩意、未发表的研究和未完成的艺术品。

Anniversaries are normally opportunities for reappraising the legacy of the great man or woman concerned. Da Vinci's highlights the fact that, outside the field of painting, his legacy—as distinct from his genius—was modest. He had brilliant intuitions in fields as diverse as anatomy and hydraulics, but because he failed to publish his theories and findings, hundreds of years were to pass before they were discovered by someone else.
一般来讲，重新评价与伟人相关的遗留下来的东西，周年纪念是个好机会。达·芬奇遗留下来的东西强调了一个事实，那就是在绘画领域之外，和他的天才不同，其他领域的遗留下来的东西是谦逊的。他在解剖学和水力学等各个领域都有卓越的直觉，但是因为他没有发表其理论和发现，几百年后才被其他人发现。

Even his artistic oeuvre, though sublime, is minute. Fewer than 20 finished works are generally attributed to da Vinci. He failed to complete some of his most important commissions such as the “Adoration of the Magi”. His ill-fated experimentation with materials ruined others, including “The Last Supper”. Hence the paucity of exhibitions devoted to his art in what should be his year of years. Florence is commemorating him with a show devoted to his master, Verrocchio.
即使他的全部艺术作品，尽管崇高，但数量很少。一般只有不到二十幅完成作品被公认为是达·芬奇的作品。有些重要的作品未能完成，如《三博士朝圣》。他以失败告终的材料实验还毁坏了其他画作，包括《最后的晚餐》。因此，在他所处的年代里，很少有展览专门介绍他的艺术。佛罗伦萨用一场他老师韦罗基奥的展览来纪念他。

Born out of wedlock in 1452, the son of a notary and a peasant woman, da Vinci had a lonely childhood and—probably lefthanded and almost certainly gay—grew up something of a misfit. He spent much of his life outside his native Tuscany in Milan, Rome and finally France as the guest of King Francis I. He died at Amboise in 1519.
达·芬奇于1452年非婚生，父亲是一名公证人，母亲是一名农民。他童年孤独，可能是左撇子，几乎可以肯定是同性恋，长大后与所处的环境有些不相合。他一生的大部分时光都在家乡托斯卡纳以外的罗马、米兰度过，最终受邀弗朗西斯一世国王客居法国。于1519年逝于安博瓦兹。

Such is the status he has acquired as the definitive, universal genius that the few questions raised in his quincentenary year are being put almost surreptitiously, as in a show at the Scuderie del Quirinale in Rome that largely comprises models based on da Vinci's designs. It opens with a display of treatises and often exquisite drawings by other Tuscan artist-engineers, including Francesco di Giorgio Martini, that show da Vinci was far from unique in combining technology with painting—and that some of his peers managed to get a lot more built or printed than he did.
这就是他作为一个权威、全能天才所获得的地位，以至于在他五百年诞辰之际提出的几个问题几乎都是秘密进行的，正如罗马的基里纳莱博物馆举办的一场展览，虽然展出的大多是基于达·芬奇设计的模型，但展览一开始展示了包括弗朗西斯科·迪乔治·马提尼在内的托斯卡纳艺术家和工程师们的论文和精美画作，这表明达·芬奇在将科技与绘画结合起来方面远非独一家，而且他的同行们的作品成果更多。