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Guinness World Records lists Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa as having the highest insurance value for a painting. On permanent display at the Louvre in Paris, the Mona Lisa was assessed at US$100 million on 14 December 1962. Taking inflation into account, the 1962 value would be around US$1010 million in 2023.
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There has been much speculation and debate regarding the identity of the Mona Lisa’s sitter. Scholars and historians have posited numerous possibilities, including that she is Lisa del Giocondo (née Gherardini), wife of the Florentine merchant Francesco di Bartolomeo del Giocondo—hence the alternative title to the work, La Gioconda. That identity was first suggested in 1550 by artist biographer Giorgio Vasari.
How many years did it take to paint the Mona Lisa?
Leonardo da Vinci began painting the Mona Lisa in 1503, and it was in his studio when he died in 1519. He likely worked on it intermittently over several years, adding multiple layers of thin oil glazes at different times. Small cracks in the paint, called craquelure, appear throughout the whole piece, but they are finer on the hands, where the thinner glazes correspond to Leonardo’s late period.
Where is the real Mona Lisa kept?
The Mona Lisa hangs behind bulletproof glass in a gallery of the Louvre Museum in Paris, where it has been a part of the museum’s collection since 1804. It was part of the royal collection before becoming the property of the French people during the Revolution (1787–99).
Louvre
The painting presents a woman in half-body portrait, which has as a backdrop a distant landscape. Yet this simple description of a seemingly standard composition gives little sense of Leonardo’s achievement. The three-quarter view, in which the sitter’s position mostly turns toward the viewer, broke from the standard profile pose used in Italian art and quickly became the convention for all portraits, one used well into the 21st century. The subject’s softly sculptural face shows Leonardo’s skillful handling of sfumato (use of fine shading) and reveals his understanding of the musculature and the skull beneath the skin. The delicately painted veil, the finely wrought tresses, and the careful rendering of folded fabric demonstrate Leonardo’s studied observations and inexhaustible patience. Moreover, the sensuous curves of the sitter’s hair and clothing are echoed in the shapes of the valleys and rivers behind her. The sense of overall harmony achieved in the painting—especially apparent in the sitter’s faint smile—reflects Leonardo’s idea of the cosmic link connecting humanity and nature, making this painting an enduring record of Leonardo’s vision. In its exquisite synthesis of sitter and landscape, the Mona Lisa set the standard for all future portraits.
There has been much speculation and debate regarding the identity of the portrait’s sitter. Scholars and historians have posited numerous interpretations, including that she is Lisa del Giocondo (née Gherardini), the wife of the Florentine merchant Francesco di Bartolomeo del Giocondo, hence the alternative title to the work, La Gioconda. That identity was first suggested in 1550 by artist biographer Giorgio Vasari. Another theory was that the model may have been Leonardo’s mother, Caterina. That interpretation was put forth by, among others, Sigmund Freud, who seemed to think that the Mona Lisa’s mysterious smile emerged from a—perhaps unconscious—memory of Caterina’s smile. A third suggestion was that the painting was, in fact, Leonardo’s self-portrait, given the resemblance between the sitter’s and the artist’s facial features. Some scholars suggested that disguising himself as a woman was the artist’s riddle. The sitter’s identity has not been definitively proven. Numerous attempts in the 21st century to settle the debate by seeking Lisa del Giocondo’s remains to test her DNA and recreate an image of her face were inconclusive.
Leonardo da Vinci began painting the Mona Lisa about 1503, and it was in his studio when he died in 1519. He likely worked on it intermittently over several years, adding multiple layers of thin oil glazes at different times. Small cracks in the paint, called craquelure, appear throughout the whole piece, but they are finer on the hands, where the thinner glazes correspond to Leonardo’s late period.
French King Francis I, in whose court Leonardo spent the last years of his life, acquired the work after the artist’s death, and it became part of the royal collection. For centuries the portrait was secluded in French palaces, until insurgents claimed the royal collection as the property of the people during the French Revolution (1787–99). Following a period hanging in Napoleon’s bedroom, the Mona Lisa was installed in the Louvre Museum at the turn of the 19th century.
In 1911 the painting was stolen, causing an immediate media sensation. People flocked to the Louvre to view the empty space where the painting had once hung, the museum’s director of paintings resigned, and the poet Guillaume Apollinaire and artist Pablo Picasso were even arrested as suspects. Two years later an art dealer in Florence alerted local authorities that a man had tried to sell him the painting. Police found the portrait stashed in the false bottom of a trunk belonging to Vincenzo Peruggia, an Italian immigrant who had briefly worked at the Louvre fitting glass on a selection of paintings, including the Mona Lisa. He and possibly two other workers had hidden in a closet overnight, taken the portrait from the wall the morning of August 21, 1911, and run off without suspicion. Peruggia was arrested, tried, and imprisoned, while the Mona Lisa took a tour of Italy before making its triumphant return to France.
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During World War II the Mona Lisa, singled out as the most-endangered artwork in the Louvre, was evacuated to various locations in France’s countryside, returning to the museum in 1945 after peace had been declared. It later traveled to the United States in 1963, drawing about 40,000 people per day during its six-week stay at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City and at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. It also toured to Tokyo and Moscow in 1974.
Scholars have noted that the Mona Lisa is in fairly good condition for its age. The poplar panel shows some evidence of warping from resistance to its original frame and to braces added by early restorers. To prevent the widening of a small crack, visible near the centre of the upper edge of the painting, dovetails were added to the back of the painting. Restorers later pasted heavy canvas over the crack and replaced the top dovetail.
The glass protecting the Mona Lisa was replaced with a bulletproof case after several attacks in 1956, one of which damaged an area near the subject’s left elbow. The Mona Lisa thus escaped harm from acts of vandalism in 1974 during the work’s visit to Tokyo and in 2009 when a museumgoer threw a ceramic mug at it.
- The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
The Mona Lisa is priceless. Any speculative price (some say over a billion dollars!) would probably be so high that not one person would be able or willing to purchase and maintain the painting. Moreover, the Louvre Museum would probably never sell it.
The Mona Lisa ( / ˌmoʊnə ˈliːsə / MOH-nə LEE-sə; Italian: Gioconda [dʒoˈkonda] or Monna Lisa [ˈmɔnna ˈliːza]; French: Joconde [ʒɔkɔ̃d]) is a half-length portrait painting by Italian artist Leonardo da Vinci.
Learn how the Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci is valued at over $908 million, adjusted for inflation, and why it is so expensive. Discover the mystery, the smile, the techniques, the heist, and the tour of the legendary painting.
Apr 22, 2024 · Learn about the fascinating history, art style, and value of the Mona Lisa, the most famous painting in the world. Find out how it was stolen, restored, and insured, and why it has a mysterious smile and a following.
May 26, 2024 · In 2018, the Mona Lisa was featured in Beyoncé and Jay-Z’s music video. During the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, the Louvre Museum created a virtual reality of the Mona Lisa. If the Mona Lisa was assessed today, it would be worth over $900 million, making it the most expensive painting in the world.
