500th Anniversary of the Death of Leonardo da Vinci

A detail from Leonardo da Vinci's painting "Lady with an Ermine", held at the Czartoryski Museum in Kraków. To the left, the inscription "Leonardo", the initials "M.A.C." of artist Maria Angela Cassol, and the Italian Republic abbreviation "RI"; to the right of the portrait, the Rome Mint mark "R" and the dates "1519" — da Vinci's year of death — and "2019" as the issue and anniversary year.

In the final decade of Leonardo da Vinci's life - he died on 2 May 1519 at the Château du Clos Lucé in Amboise, France - a body of work took shape that still has no true parallel today. The Florentine, born in 1452 in Vinci near Empoli, combined artistic mastery with systematic observation of nature in a way that reached far beyond his own time. His paintings, including the portrait of a young woman with an ermine, known as "Lady with an Ermine" and today held at the National Museum in Kraków, are seen as turning points in the history of European painting: psychological depth, subtle physicality and a vividness in the depiction of light and movement never seen before. At the same time, Leonardo filled thousands of pages with anatomical studies, machine designs, hydraulic systems and observations on geology - notes whose full significance was only grasped centuries later.

Italy honoured Leonardo da Vinci as part of its cultural heritage early on: in Florence, Milan and Rome, his traces are still tangible today - from Santa Maria delle Grazie with the Last Supper to the Uffizi with his early works. Research on his work is internationally organised, and the number of institutions and exhibitions devoted to his name is enormous. For the 500th anniversary of his death in 2019, Italy marked the occasion with numerous events, exhibitions and publications - and, in this context, also issued a 2-euro commemorative coin dedicated to a motif from his pictorial work.