Landscape drawing
© Gabinetto dei Disegni e delle Stampe degli Uffizi
  • Landscape drawing © Gabinetto dei Disegni e delle Stampe degli Uffizi

About us

Leonardo occupies a unique place in human endeavour. Universal Leonardo is a highly innovative project that aims to radically extend public understanding and appreciation of the deep unity and extraordinary diversity of Leonardo da Vinci’s work in all his fields of endeavour.

Universal Leonardo presents a series of linked European exhibitions, some of which are informed by scientific investigations, that reveal new dimensions in the legacy of the greatest visual thinker of all time.

The “venue” is Europe. The Universal Leonardo philosophy is to challenge the blockbuster exhibition, where art treasures are transported to one venue. For security and conservation reasons, overseas travel for paintings and drawings is avoided wherever possible. Linked exhibitions are created at or near the permanent collections holding Leonardo material. A travel programme makes it possible to move between exhibitions in the various European centres.

The Universal Leonardo programme is supported by some of the foremost scholars and interpreters in the field who enable fresh insights to be communicated to specialists and the wider public alike.

It is our ambitions for a new Leonardo to emerge, no less astonishing, but more real than the Leonardo of legend.

Martin Kemp and Marina Wallace
Directors of Universal Leonardo