Leonardo Da Vinci — painter, sculptor, inventor, observer, and recorder — was one of Florence’s best known artists. Though fewer than two dozen paintings attributed to Leonardo exist, his fame and influence were widespread. Known for his soft, smoky modeling of form, or sfumato, and his handling of graceful expressive figures, solid sculptural form, and distant space, Leonardo’s skills far exceeded the abilities of his contemporaries. Trained as a teenager in the workshop of Andrea del Verrocchio, Leonardo’s precocious talents were already apparent, and he was soon to come to the attention of Ludovico il Moro, the Duke of Milan, who employed Leonardo on many different projects. Leonardo took on few students, with Vasari claiming young Jacopo Pontormo as one.