Today, most kids may recognize the names Leonardo and Michelangelo from a group of turtles, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles who take their names from the Italian Renaissance masters.
Mark Rodgers, the curator of the DaVinci Machines Exhibition, which is on loan from the Museum of Leonardo Da Vinci in Florence, Italy and on display at the Bradenton Auditorium, argues that one of the best things we can learn from Leonardo and Michelangelo, is to take time to think, deeply.
And he's hoping that message will resonate with young and old. Rodgers said, "When they brought me a replica of Michelangelo's desk, he didn't call it that. He called it his "contemplative place."
Rodgers is quick to point out that although we recognize both Michelangelo and Leonardo as geniuses, Michelangelo, he said came up with the best quote ever. "If they knew how much work went into it they wouldn't call it genius."
Rodgers himself was not steeped in the works of the Renaissance Masters until about four years ago, when a friend approached him and his brother to encourage them to work on the DaVinci exhibition. Back then, he and his brother were in real estate in St. Louis.
But after learning about the thousands of inventions of Leonardo, Rodgers was hooked. "The more I learned, the more I wanted to learn and the more I wanted to pass it on."
This Saturday (April 19), he will be doing just that at the Van Wezel in Sarasota as he presents, "DaVinci and Michelangelo: Side By Side."
