Leonardo developed an exceptional ability to explore the notion of ‘knowing how to see’.

Leonardo da Vinci attributed many of his scientific and artistic discoveries to a principle he called sapere vedere — ‘knowing how to see.’ It’s a term that has ingrained itself into philosophical and scientific domains we still practice today. Yet in more recent times, it’s often found itself as a mere tagline for rather simplistic sloganeering.

Francesco Melzi, Portrait of Leonardo da Vinci, c. 1510 — ***Francesco Melzi***, *Portrait of Leonardo da Vinci*, c. 1510

Leonardo believed that his sense of sight and the ability to visualize and map abstract meanings marked one of the core principles of ‘seeing’ and understanding the world. He refers to this in his Notebooks, “The poet ranks far below the painter in the representation of visible things, and far below the musician in that of invisible things.” But for music, word, or image lovers, it isn’t easy to rank these faculties in the same way. A simple awareness of their curious tentacles can be enough of a reward for many of us. And that idea remains at the core of Leonardo’s explorations. Still, those who devote themselves to these pursuits are often met with a type of apathy or boredom when sharing their discoveries. Thoughts and reflections about domestic, political, or philosophical life can appear as too intense, too obscure, or too sensitive to what’s more familiar or obvious to one’s senses.

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Unfortunately, there are things in these hurried acts of ‘seeing’ that can unknowingly shape our social, political, and societal outlooks for the worse. Visual biases can delude and divide our ways of seeing. And they remain quite difficult to recognize through many life-narratives many can be prone to following. Our perceptions remain filtered by them. Yet, perhaps Leonardo’s acts of ‘saper vedere’ might hold some possibilities? Perhaps it could help to acknowledge the follies in our more overbearing worldviews? These types of explorations can become more like primal screams, pushing us further into the spirit of another inner and outer world. From this vantage, ‘Saper vedere’ can test our knowledge and the immediate decrees we often blindly follow. This a crucial distinction that Leonardo’s ‘knowing how to see’ can cultivate.

Sir John Gilbert, Cordelia in the Court of King Lear, c.1873 — ***Sir John Gilbert,*** Cordelia in the Court of King Lear, c.1873

Like many of Shakespeare’s famous fables (King Lear or Macbeth), it illustrates that through a type of unravelling of ourselves, we can paradoxically begin to see our being’s in a more full state. This notion has sometimes been described as a state of empathic reflection. And lacking it is not just an act of selfishness, but determined unawareness. Those who are un-empathic remain unwilling to venture into new parts of their conscious life. Their current states of belief remain untested and weakly sufficient. Still, we contain multitudes within ourselves that are often not immediately recognized. And if we aspire to understand our realities in more penetrating ways, these multitudes demand patient reflection and insight.

Study of the proportions of the head, c. 1488-9

In many ways, DaVinci embodied the sense of ‘being’ to its fullest, cultivating a refinement of all the senses. He frustratingly reflected that the average person “looks without seeing, listens without hearing, touches without feeling, eats without tasting, moves without physical awareness, inhales without awareness of odour or fragrance, and talks without thinking.” He managed to maintain a fearless curiosity about the world, exploring beyond typical ‘ideals’ of beauty. This curiosity held no real bounds, unafraid to explore anatomies and structures of all kinds. For DaVinci, like countless other artists, scientists and thinkers across time, the task remains “not to be constrained by present reality.” And for all the works that follow, this remains their catalyst of thought and reflection.