The art in perspective
14 February 1404 25 April 1472 a major figure of the Renaissance perspective, computer mathematics and art theorist, Leon Battista Alberti was born in Genova in 1404, illegitimate son of Lorenzo Alberti, an exiled Florentine exponent of a rich merchant family, banished from Florence in 1382 for political reasons. He studied in Padua, devoting himself especially to the study of letters. This sparks his love for classicism, so much so that later it will dial the "Descriptio Urbis Romae", the first systematic survey for a reconstruction of the Roman city. He moved then to Bologna to undertake the study of Canon law and Greek, not excluding from its interests in music, painting, sculpture, architecture and the physico-mathematical sciences. Following the death of his father in 1421, but serious disagreements arise with family in addition to economic hardship, the same ones that probably led him to take religious orders and start your career in the Church. In 1431 he becomes Secretary of the Patriarch of Grado and in 1432, now having moved to Rome, he was appointed Apostolic abbreviator (a charge that was to countersign the "short" apostolici, i.e. the provisions that the Pope sent to the bishops), a post he held for 34 years during which lived between Rome, Ferrara, Bologna and Florence. Given the importance of his activity as an architect and artist, an important part of his literary output consists of architectural treatises (the "De re aedificatoria", 1452, monumental work in ten volumes that gave him fame as "Vitruvius of new architecture"), painting ("De pictura", 1435, later translated by himself in the vernacular as "painting") and sculpture. In his writings, starting with considerations for antiquities, works out the theory that the beauty is nothing but harmony, expressed mathematically, between the whole and its parts: from here, the idea that in the "scaling" of the Roman buildings are the basis of architectural design. Starting in 1433 he dedicated himself to composition in the vernacular of the four "family Books", perhaps his masterpiece, completed in 1441. The Treaty plays a dialogue which took place in Padua in 1421 which was attended by four members of the Alberti family, to which the author adds a fifth, Baptist, a fictional character who probably plays the same Aaron young. In this dialogue collide two opposing visions: on the one hand, the new modern, bourgeois mentality and, on the other the past tradition. Among his numerous achievements in the field of architecture, remember that he is the author of the so-called Tempio Malatestiano in Rimini and the Palazzo Rucellai in Florence; who was responsible for the fulfillment of Santa Maria Novella (always in the city Medici), the Church of Sant'Andrea in Mantua and Ferrara Cathedral Tower. In summary, we can say that Leon Battista Alberti sums up the characteristics of the new man of the Renaissance, the so-called "universal man", an example of which was brought to the highest heights by Leonardo. Are artists and intellectuals, those of the Renaissance, whose talent and versatility allowed them to Excel in various cultural environments. As regards the production of genius genovese, is still to remember the composition in 1450 the "Momus" (Momo), satirical novel lying in Latin, where he is, with some bitterness, relations between literature and political power. Also, don't forget the Latin Apologists of 1437, sort of Breviary of his philosophy of life. After a long, intense and fruitful life, he died in Rome on 25 April 1472.