Leonardo Da Vinci vs Michelangelo: ultimate Renaissance reckoning at IDEAL

The Mona Lisa, or The Sistine Chapel? The Last Supper, or Pietà? Vitruvian Man, or David? 

Impossible choices? 

Well, at IDEAL Digital Arts Centre in Barcelona, visitors are going to have to decide which Renaisance Man takes the crown. 

Leonardo versus Michelangelo takes a look at the lives, legacies, and rivalry between these two historic greats of art.

These pair lived at the same time in Florence in the 15th and 16th centuries, and although they initially respected each other, they quickly developed a bitter rivalry.

Some accounts point to an altercation on the street over an interpretation of Dante’s ‘Divine Comedy’ as the genesis of the feud, but the rivalry heated up further when they were both commissioned to paint battle scenes on opposite walls of the Council Hall in Florence’s Palazzo Vecchio. 

There were sharp artistic and ideological differences between Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo Buonarroti.

True to an empirical view of knowledge, Da Vinci believed that truth and beauty could be grasped through the senses. Michelangelo, on the other hand, believed that beauty was a divine manifestation, and that humanity could attain it through inspiration.

Da Vinci valued painting as the highest form of art, while Michelangelo believed in the three-dimensionality of sculpture. "An ideal path of art versus an empirical path of art," as Anna Pou, artistic advisor at IDEAL, told Catalan News.

Throughout the exhibition, IDEAL give visitors the responsibility of choosing which of these legendary artists comes out on top. They are asked to choose if they prefer the scientific approach of Leonardo, or the inspired approach of Michelangelo. 

Production

The exhibition is the largest production of Catalan studio Layers of Reality. 

Previous Layers of Reality shows have been presented in more than 50 cities around the world, gathering more than 8 million visits.

Pou celebrates the fact that immersive experiences are so well received by the public and says that since opening IDEAL in 2019, they have not stopped growing.

She points out that people have a "desire to learn," and this is why "accessibility" must be guaranteed. "Here we do it with historic rigor and, at the same time, in a playful and entertaining way."

She also believes that people who are dedicated to culture and art should be committed to new ways of talking about different topics. "Culture doesn't have to be boring, it can be learned in a fun way," she concludes.