da Vinci's workshop uncovered

[paineinthearse]

http://dailytelegraph.news.com.au/story.jsp?sectionid=1268&storyid=2568584

January 27, 2005

ROME: A forgotten workshop of Italian artist Leonardo da Vinci, complete with 500-year-old frescos and a secret room to dissect human cadavers, was discovered in Florence, Italy, researchers said.

The find was made in part of the Santissima Annunziata convent, which let out rooms to artists centuries ago and where the likely muse of the Renaissance artist's masterwork, the Mona Lisa, may have worshipped.

"It's a bit absurd to think that, in 2005, we have found the studio of one of history's greatest artists," said Roberto Manescalchi, one of three researchers credited for this month's find.

Frescos adorning part of the workshop were left undisturbed and forgotten over the centuries.

The wing was eventually split by a wall and is partially claimed today by the Institute of Military Geography.

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ABC "Good Morning America" had some video.

[displacedtexan]

1. Truly cool!

Thanks for posting this gem!

Good news is greatly appreciated!

[WannaJumpMyScooter]

2. Very strange. I had heard rumors that something like this

existed from an art historian. She had tried to find it for years, but without any success.
Too bad she died before they found it.

[pinniped]

3. That is very cool.

I have read there are skeptics, but this is cool nonetheless.

[paineinthearse]

4. Not quite "latest"

There is a flurry of stories hitting the newswires today, but the lead in this thread was not first. Why the slow uptake (January 12 - today) and sudden flurry today, I cannot explain. Here are the oldest I can find:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-1435948,00.html

January 12, 2005

Found: the studio where Leonardo met Mona Lisa
From Richard Owen in Rome

ONE of the enduring mysteries of the Renaissance has been resolved with the discovery of the workshop of Leonardo da Vinci in Florence, it was announced yesterday. The workshop, where Leonardo painted and drew in the early 1500s, is in the monastery of Santissima Annunziata in the centre of Florence. It is decorated with frescoes thought to be by Leonardo and his students. It was here that Leonardo is likely to have met the woman who inspired the Mona Lisa and worked on The Virgin and Child with St Anne, one version of which is held by the National Gallery. His workshop was discovered during restoration of part of the monastery occupied for the past 100 years by the Institute of Military Geography. Cristina Acidini, head of conservation and restoration in Florence, said it was an “emotional moment” when the worskhop was found.

Giorgio Vasari, the Renaissance biographer and artist, recorded in his Lives of the Artists that the friars of the monastery “took him into their house and met all his expenses and that of his household”. But his workshop had never been identified until now. “We need to do more research, but these frescoes are very encouraging,” Signora Acidini told the Florence newspaper La Nazione.

One striking fresco depicts the face of a winged angel flanked by birds, thought to be a representation of the Annunciation. Scholars said it bore a resemblance to an Annunciation by Leonardo in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence. Alessandro Vezzosi, a leading Leonardo expert, said the discovery of the workshop “will enable scholars better to understand the context in which Leonardo worked”.

The three researchers who found it, Maria Carchio, Alessandro Del Meglio and Roberto Manescalchi, also discovered a hidden staircase and doorway from the monastery to the workshop which had been covered up during earlier building conversions.

more......

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http://news.independent.co.uk/europe/story.jsp?story=599962

Discovery of hidden laboratory sheds light on Leonardo's genius
By John Phillips in Rome
12 January 2005

Researchers have discovered the hidden laboratory used by Leonardo da Vinci for studies of flight and other pioneering scientific work in previously sealed rooms at a monastery next to the Basilica of the Santissima Annunziata, in the heart of Florence.

more.......

[fertilizeonarbusto]

5. Wow

This is truly cool!!!!!!!!