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https://youtu.be/aAi5FHSkUAQ?si=eJNnBb5ceQatnAqiRusanda Panfili (violin) and Tina Guo (cello) just kill it here. They experience every note they play at a level at which we can only guess. The last 5 minutes of The Da Vinci Code as linked below are a cinematic masterpiece. Combined with Zimmer's otherworldly composition, it frames the sudden dawn of understanding, of revelation. It is the triumph of intellect and reason, of faith and spirit distilled and channeled into one stunning and moving realization. Those of you who have read the book and seen the movie know what I'm talking about. Even moreso if you've read Holy...

This is one of those days when the Babylon Bee staff must shrug and wonder why they work so hard, when the real world of the left is working for you for free. A real story: The Mona Lisa was attacked by a cake-throwing eco-warrior in a bizarre stunt that thankfully failed to damage her famous smile. Videos posted on social media appear to show a young man in a wig and lipstick arriving at the Louvre in Paris in a wheelchair Sunday — then leaping up and attacking Leonardo da Vinci’s 16th-century masterpiece. The man, who was not immediately...

Climate activists hurled soup on the Mona Lisa on Sunday morning at the Louvre museum in Paris

French farmers are using their tractors to set up road blockades and slow traffic across France to seek better remuneration for their produce, less red tape and protection against cheap importsTwo climate activists hurled soup Sunday at the glass protecting the Mona Lisa at the Louvre Museum in Paris and shouted slogans advocating for a sustainable food system. This came amid protests by French farmers against several issues, including low wages. In a video posted on social media, two women with the words “FOOD RIPOSTE” written on their t-shirts could be seen passing under a security barrier to get closer...

It’s enough to wipe the smile off her face. A pair of climate-change activists hurled pumpkin soup at the Mona Lisa on Sunday at the Louvre Museum in Paris as onlookers gasped, shocking new video shows. “What is more important?” the crazed activists shouted in French. “Art or the right to have a healthy and sustainable food system?” The two nuts are members of the activist group called “Riposte Alimetaire,” or Food Response, which issued a statement saying the stunt was meant to highlight the need to protect the environment.

Bubbles Red Arrow Five centuries ago, Leonardo da Vinci observed air bubbles deviating from a straight path in a zigzag or spiral motion. However, the cause of this periodic motion remained unknown until now. Researchers from the universities of Seville and Bristol have solved the mystery surrounding the unsteady path of an air bubble rising in water. Professors Miguel Ángel Herrada of the University of Seville and Jens G. Eggers of the University of Bristol have uncovered a mechanism that explains the erratic movement of bubbles rising in water. The findings, published in the prestigious journal Proceedings of the National...

The Italian government on Wednesday said police had seized more than 5,000 ancient artefacts in a record 45-million-euro haul after dismantling a Swiss-Italian trafficking ring. Culture Minister Dario Franceschini said it was the country's "largest discovery yet" of looted works and consisted of 5,361 pieces, including vases, jewellery, frescoes and bronze statues, all dating from the 8th century BC to the 3rd century AD. The archaeological treasures came from illegal digs across Italy and "will be returned to where they were found", the minister told reporters. Police said the items were worth around 45 million euros ($52 million) and were...

In the late 1480s, Leonardo da Vinci sketched out a clever design for a one-person helicopter propelled by an "aerial screw." Starting in 2019, a University of Maryland engineering team designed and tested the underlying technology as part of a design contest. Then over the last year and a half, team member Austin Prete built Crimson Spin, an unmanned quadcopter drone using da Vinci's screwlike design, and flew it on several brief journeys. Although Prete built only a small drone, the technology could work with an aircraft big enough to haul a human. "I do believe it should be able...

LONDON (Reuters) - Leonardo da Vinci's drawings of machines are uncannily similar to Chinese originals and were undoubtedly derived from them, a British amateur historian says in a newly-published book. Gavin Menzies sparked headlines across the globe in 2002 with the claim that Chinese sailors reached America 70 years before Christopher Columbus. Now he says a Chinese fleet brought encyclopedias of technology undiscovered by the West to Italy in 1434, laying the foundation for the engineering marvels such as flying machines later drawn by Italian polymath Leonardo.

Paper offers foundation to advance search for Leonardo’s DNA. Leonardo Da Vinci: New family tree spans 21 generations, 690 years, finds 14 living male descendants. The surprising results of a decade-long investigation by Alessandro Vezzosi and Agnese Sabato provide a strong basis for advancing a project researching Leonardo da Vinci’s DNA. Their extensive study, published by the journal “Human Evolution” (Pontecorboli Editore, Florence), documents with new certainty the continuous male line, from father to son, of the Da Vinci family (later Vinci), from progenitor Michele (born 1331) to grandson Leonardo (6th generation, born 1452) through to today — 21 generations...

A European collector has bought a 17th century copy of Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa painting for 2.9 million euros ($3.4 million), a record for a Mona Lisa reproduction, in an auction at Christie's in Paris on Friday. Known as the "Hekking Mona Lisa," after its owner who unsuccessfully argued that a copy he had bought in the 1950s was the real thing, is one of many reproductions of the original, which hangs in the Paris Louvre museum. "This is madness, this is an absolute record for a Mona Lisa reproduction," a Christie's spokeswoman said. She said there had been...

"It is machination, it is deception," said the director general of the Berlin Royal Museums in his defense when criticized for buying a fake. Wilhelm Bode did not budge an inch: The sculpture he acquired in 1909 was an as-yet unknown production of the great Renaissance master Leonardo da Vinci.After 100 years and numerous controversies, a group of scientists led by a CNRS researcher has just proven him wrong once and for all. The Flora wax bust, conserved at the Bode Museum in Berlin, recently underwent radiocarbon (14C) dating, which provided both a precise date and an incontrovertible result: It...

It may be surprising for many to hear that a Reformation occurred in Italy. We normally use the term “Reformation” to describe the defection of Protestants from Roman obedience in places like Wittenberg, Strasbourg, Zurich, and Geneva. But surely the Italian peninsula was always loyal to the papacy? Yet Italy was also poised for gospel renewal in the opening decades of the 16th century. Waves of invasions by French and Habsburg armies, epidemic diseases such as syphilis, harvest failures, and a growing resentment toward clerical authority produced a generation of troubled hearts. And, as they did else elsewhere, reformers in...

LEONARDO DA VINCI's masterpiece the Mona Lisa has captivated art lovers for centuries - but now, a scientist who analysed every inch and layer of the famous portrait has discovered hidden details beneath the painter's brushstrokes.The early 16th Century painting is arguably one of da Vinci’s most famous works and currently resides in the Louvre, in Paris. It’s estimated that 80 percent of their annual 10.2 million visitors attend to see the Mona Lisa. Scientist Pascal Cotte was asked to digitise the painting using a specialist camera, which was able to capture hidden layers beneath the portrait. From his multispectral...

Explanation: How come the crescent Moon doesn't look like this? For one reason, because your eyes can't simultaneously discern bright and dark regions like this. Called earthshine or the da Vinci glow, the unlit part of a crescent Moon is visible but usually hard to see because it is much dimmer than the sunlit arc. In our digital age, however, the differences in brightness can be artificially reduced. The featured image is actually a digital composite of 15 short exposures of the bright crescent, and 14 longer exposures of the dim remainder. The origin of the da Vinci glow, as...

A new study of the microbial settlers on old paintings, sculptures, and other forms of art charts a potential path for preserving, restoring, and confirming the geographic origin of some of humanity's greatest treasures. Genetics scientists with the J. Craig Venter Institute (JCVI), collaborating with the Leonardo da Vinci DNA Project and supported by the Richard Lounsbery Foundation, say identifying and managing communities of microbes on art may offer museums and collectors a new way to stem the deterioration of priceless possessions, and to unmask counterfeits in the $60 billion a year art market... The genetic detectives caution that additional...

If accepted at the time, the design would have likely revolutionized architecture. ======================================================================== In the early 1500s, Leonardo da Vinci designed a hypothetical bridge for the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire. It was rejected. Over 500 years later, an MIT team has recreated the design with a model and have showed that it would have worked. Da Vinci's design incorporates architectural techniques that would have not been seen for another 300 years. ========================================================================== Gretchen Ertl ========================================================================= Researchers at MIT have proven Leonardo da Vinci correct yet again, this time involving his design for what would have been at the time...

A video uploaded to YouTube last week by engineer Egor Zakharov shows the iconic portrait translated into three different video clips, each featuring Mona Lisa moving her mouth and turning her head as if in conversation — demonstrating that we can now produce realistic avatars using a single image. Moscow-based Zakharov, an AI researcher with the Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology and the Samsung AI Center, and his colleagues published their findings, which have not been peer-reviewed, in the journal arXiv. Three-dimensional models of the human head are deeply complex, requiring “tens of millions of parameters,” the study authors...

Image courtesy of HTC VIVE Arts

Saudi Arabia sparked one of the art world’s biggest mysteries when it paid $450 million for Leonardo da Vinci’s “Salvator Mundi” painting three years ago. Since then, the kingdom has kept the world’s priciest painting out of sight—fueling mounting questions about its fate. Now, some answers are starting to emerge. The kingdom’s new Ministry of Culture plans to keep the masterpiece in storage until it can build a new museum to unveil it, according to people familiar with the matter. The plans—kept secret until now—are part of a multibillion-dollar push by the Saudis to become a major international art destination,...