Mod 9, Mike n Leo

One of the videos I've selected for this weeks video review was The Drawings of Michelangelo.  The video
 showcases several of Michelangelos work, but primarily focuses on his development as an artist and the inner workings of his thought processes.   The video shows us several of Michelangelos works, as well as many of the design stages of these major works.  There is much to be found in viewing the design stages, as we can really see what the artist was thinking in producing and planning.  It's interesting, as mentioned in the article most of the sketches and design prototypes were destroyed, not through war or other destructive activity, but by the artist himself.  One thing that was learned through the sketches was that much of
Michelangelos work and early learnings show much of the same techniques used by his mentor.  Although
Michelangelo claims to owe little to his mentor, he owed much to his teachings.  Also, we can see how exactly the artist came about some of his works.

The other video I selected was Leonardo da Vinci: The Mind of the Renaissance. I selected this video because I wanted to compare da Vinci and Michelangelo.  Da Vincis life, while similar, seemed to be painted in the video in a much darker sense.  Forced to cope with much political strife, da Vinci seemed to travel a lot more.  Also, due to many other factors including his own doing, there seem to have been many works by Da Vinci which never were completed.  This is a shame, as there may have been many more works from him for us to flounder over.  Interestingly enough it seems that there was some dissent between these two men.  This makes sense, as both existed during the same time and surely had to hear about how great the other was.  It's too bad, perhaps with different circumstances the two may have worked together to create.  Similarly, it seems both men left little to go on with regards to the stages of their work.  Maybe it was due to the times or their own desire for perfection, but each man did much to prevent their sketches from remaining and being shown to the world.

The movies differ from the books in that rather than focusing on the works specifically and who they were being made for, the videos showed really a much deeper, more 'real' version of these men.  It questioned and focused on their inner workings, and really how their work correlated with their stage in life.  The book gave a much more paper man type feel to the artists, and seems to have forgotten that in light of their accomplishments, they also suffered and experienced what we all do.  It was a much more relatable way to get to 'know' the artists.  I feel that the videos did this very well, even if the video on Leonardo seemed rather dark and sort of depressing.