Feb

10

You, Me and Leonardo da Vinci

February 10, 2007 |

[-essay, practically mperfect-]

practically Mperfect

by guest contributor, Karen Hatzigeorgiou

Are you one of those types of people who always has several different projects going at the same time? I know I am. Right now I have five unfinished altered books and four collages in varying stages of completion. I’m in the middle of reading two different books and two different magazines. I have two different journals — one in a little moleskin book I keep in my purse and another composition notebook that I keep by my bed. I’ve been trying to clean up my office-slash-studio (a never ending battle similar to trying to keep up with the laundry,) but am also in the middle of painting and redecorating my youngest son’s bedroom. I’m sure I’ll get most of what I’ve started completed someday, but if I don’t– so what?

Now I’m not saying that it’s okay to not meet a deadline or to leave my son sleeping in the living room indefinitely. I’m just saying that simply because I didn’t finish that embroidery of a unicorn that’s still in my sewing box from fifteen years ago doesn’t mean that I’m a bad person. But it’s taken me a while to come to that realization. And one of the things that helped me realize that unfinished projects don’t equal failure was when I read the book How to Think Like Leonardo da Vinci by Michael J. Gelb.

This book is about being a creative thinker in the way that Leonardo da Vinci was. But what impressed me the most as I read about da Vinci’s life was discovering the number of projects that da Vinci never completed.

Consider the following: First of all, da Vinci’s journal shows elaborate plans to create the bronze statue of his idea of a perfect horse– a statue that was never made. He also did a series of sketches for a commissioned painting that he never painted. In addition, because da Vinci couldn’t bring himself to paint the face of Jesus Christ, he was never able to finish painting his great masterpiece The Last Supper. And amazingly, of the seventeen paintings of da Vinci’s still in existence, a number of them are also incomplete.

Yet despite all this unfinished work, we still consider Leonardo da Vinci to be a man of genius. He was the original “Renaissance Man,” a person whose incredible imagination and creativity spanned a broad range of disciplines such as engineering, architecture, art, and science, to name just a few.

As it turns out, I have a lot in common with Mr. da Vinci, and I’m sure that you do as well. Consider the incredible imagination and creativity we need to handle the broad range of disciplines such as child rearing, culinary arts, domestic engineering, personal management, and psychology (just to name a few) that many of us are expected to be proficient in. Not to mention the artistic talents we seek to nurture.

I find it reassuring to see the similarities between this great man’s life and my own and to know that he left many unfinished projects scattered across France and Italy. No one considers da Vinci’s life to have been a “failure.” No one consider his unfinished works to be “failures” because they were left undone. They were all valuable attempts to create a meaningful life. And they certainly didn’t stop da Vinci from his quest to find truth and beauty in the world around him, much as you and I do everyday.

So it’s time that we stop berating ourselves for starting Project B before we’ve finished Project A, or for feeling guilty for buying supplies for both tole painting and card making. And when we’re torn between cutting and pasting one more image down on that collage or putting in another load into the washing machine, we need to remember Leonardo da Vinci. Let’s look in the mirror, honor all our efforts to find truth and beauty in the world, and reward ourselves with our very own Mona Lisa smile.

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© 2005-2007 - Karen Hatzigeorgiou - all rights reserved

See Karen’s tutorial in The PCQ about her beautiful Altered Books.

About the Author: Karen Hatzigeorgiou is a wife, mother, seventh grade English teacher, and an artist and writer. This is a revision of an earlier article. You can see her art work, find tips and techniques for creating your own art, and read more of her musings at her web site at karenswhimsy.com.
You can email her at karen@karenswhimsy.com. Thanks, Karen!

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Originally published in the July 2005 issue of The Practically Creative Quarterly, theme: Space and Spaces

also posted in: Motivation , Inspiration , Essays - Contributors , The Original PCQ, 05-06 , Practically Mperfect , Perception , Contributors , Process

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