I began this essay in the “Silicon Valley of the High Renaissance”, Tuscany, 500 years after the death of Leonardo in Vinci – often interrupted and yet completed. Conceived in the face of an epochal upheaval, completed at a turning point in war-torn Europe, accompanied by multiple world crises, career changes and fatal illnesses within the family.

Sketched in the Italian estate of the enlightener and journalist Hugo Portisch, which at the time had just been bought and remodeled by his friend Michael Kraus. Kraus, whom I had the pleasure of getting to know in the course of my “ATMOS” project – more of which later – turned out to be a subtle person, an emphatic host and an old and honorary Grand Master of the Masonic Grand Lodge of Austria. His incredibly beautiful estate can confidently be described as a realm of perspectives. The days spent with the founding member of the “Prometheus” lodge proved to be inspiring and intellectually warming, the conversations with Hugo Portisch in Linz and Vienna eternally resonant.