Once the period of the Renaissance got underway, artists did not shy away from depicting the human figure, and emphasizing its attributes. One of the most famous figures of the era is Leonardo Da Vinci's Vitruvian man, considered the universal body standard according to Leonardo and others of his time. I recently generated a piece of art in stable diffusion that got my mental gears spinning. So, I dusted off an old book, made myself a cup of coffee, and began to extract some juicy tidbits about the Vitruvian man.
Delicious roast with a nice bloom during brewing
As it turns out, Leonardo was engaging in some generative art of his own. The proportions of the Vitruvian figure are based on the work of Roman architect Vitruvius Pollio. Leonardo created the figures with the original geometrical proportions but then made some corrections with an "almost one-fifth reduction in the distance between the base of the neck and the hairline" (Landrus, 2009). Close examination of the folio with light showed that tiny holes had been made with a divider (a type of compass) on the drawing. It looks like somebody, perhaps Leonardo himself, had exactly measured the proportions of the figure.
Leonardo da Vinci's Vitruvian man (Landrus, 2009)
Because of his art training and lack of formal education, Leonardo focused on demonstrating the technical and architectural view of the body by mixing diagrammatic reasoning with naturalistic observation. Another folio (Windsor 12496) contains the drawing of a model (as shown in the second image) that aligns properly to the dimensions of the Vitruvian man and is considered evidence that Leonardo wasn't just drawing from memory or arithmetic calculations. According to Landrus (2009), this mode of thinking in terms of continuous geometric proportions along with direct measurements is a transitional phase away from idealized numerical abstractions. The Vitruvian man anticipates Leonardo's later anatomical studies in which he basically sketched himself into heresy by dissecting and sketching cadavers.
Since the time of Leonardo, the arts and sciences have gone their separate ways. In modern books, you'll find wonderful scientific illustrations that capture the precise naturalistic quantifiable intricacies of our anatomy, similar to how Leonardo would've done it. But gone are the grander ambitions that sought to illuminate humans from a more universal perspective. Perhaps one day another da Vinci will come along and show us the proportions of the nervous system not only in relation to itself but to other complex structures that are intricately linked to its existence.
Resource
Landrus, Matthew. Leonardo da Vinci: The Genius, His Work and the Renaissance, 2009.
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