Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci

This painting, which is the most recognizable in the world, until 2003 was in the Louvre, in one of the halls of the Denon wing. After that, it was exhibited in another room, capable of accommodating a larger number of visitors wishing to look at the famous creation of Leonardo. It is believed that the artist painted only the lips of his heroine for ten whole years. This is the only portrait that is unconditionally attributed to Leonardo, although it does not contain either his signature or the date of the painting. It has not one, but several names. In French, the painting is called "La Joconde", and in Italian - "La Gioconda", that is, "frivolous woman." In all likelihood, this was Leonardo's favorite creation, and, apparently, for this reason, he did not part with it until the last days of his life, as Dan Brown believes. However, another reason is also possible - the work was still unfinished.

The Mona Lisa was painted in oil on poplar wood and was originally bought by the King of France for four thousand ducats. After the French Revolution, it was exhibited in the Louvre. For a while, the famous painting adorned Napoleon's bedroom, but after his expulsion from France, she again returned to the main museum in Paris. It was originally larger. Two of its panels once depicted two columns, indicating that the Mona Lisa was sitting on the terrace.

Dan Brown's suggestion that the phrase Mona Lisa is equivalent to the anagram AMON L'ISA (AMON L'ISA), which implies the unity of male and female principles, sounds intriguing. However, this phrase can equally be an anagram of the words "sun" (sol) and "soul" (anima), which are directly related to one of the main religions of the Roman Empire during the era of Emperor Constantine the Great - Sol Invictus (Invincible Sun). The cult of the Invincible Sun formed the basis of many Christian traditions.

There are several versions of who could serve as a prototype of the Mona Lisa. The hypothesis of the author of The Da Vinci Code that Leonardo depicted himself in the portrait may well be true. Computer analysis confirmed the close resemblance of Mona Lisa's facial features to those of Leonardo's famous self-portrait. However, most people believe that Mona Lisa's portrait was commissioned by her husband, Francesco Bartolomeo del Gioconda Fr.

It has long been commonplace to say that there is some mystery behind Mona Lisa's smile. One Italian doctor suggested that she suffered from bruxism, a disease that causes the patient to grind their teeth in sleep or under unexpected stress. It is known that Leonardo tried, as far as possible, to occupy his model during posing in order to minimize the inconvenience associated with this. He hired six musicians who delighted her ears with music, and took with him a white Persian cat and a greyhound dog to the workshop. The style of depicting a smile was characteristic of both Leonardo da Vinci and other painters of that era, such as his teacher Andrea del Verrocchio.

To some, this picture seems boring, but it should be noted that Leonardo reflected in it a new style for those distant years. One of his innovative tricks is the absence of jewelry on the Mona Lisa. Another violation by the artist of the conventions of his time was that he portrayed the Mona Lisa in a too calm, relaxed pose, and not in the traditionally formal and tense.

The painting technique called sfumato (the heroine of the novel The Da Vinci Code by Sophie Neveu calls it “foggy”), thanks to which the world around us appears to the viewer as if in a light haze, is the main distinguishing feature of Leonardo da Vinci’s paintings. This was his way of expressing "the perfection of nature." On the pages of his novel, Dan Brown notes that the horizon line in the picture is drawn unevenly, and the left edge is slightly lower than the right. There is an opinion that in this way Leonardo emphasized the darker side of being. On the right side of the picture we see a lake that is above the level of the current river on the left side. It can be assumed that there was a waterfall above the head of Mona Lisa, which fed the river with water coming from the lake.

Dan Brown writes that in 1911 the painting was stolen from the Louvre. The thief turned out to be an Italian who took the Mona Lisa to Italy. A whole day passed before the administration found out about the loss. At first it was suggested that a museum photographer might have taken the painting. It took a week to search all the premises of the Louvre, but the only thing that could be found was a picture frame found under the stairs. Two years later, Vincenzo Peruggia, the kidnapper of Leonardo's famous work, offered the Mona Lisa to the Uffizi Gallery for one hundred thousand dollars. In Italy, the painting was exhibited until it was returned to the capital of France.

To take the painting out of the Louvre, Perugia hid in one of the rooms and waited for the museum to close. Entering the room where the Mona Lisa was located, he removed the painting from the wall and cut it out of the frame. Since the doors of the Louvre were closed, he had to unscrew the screws that held the doorknob in place. The location of the museum halls was well known to the thief, because he was a carpenter and worked on the glazing of paintings in the Louvre.

In 1956, a mentally ill museum visitor threw acid at the Mona Lisa. The painting was removed for restoration, which lasted several years. The last time the Mona Lisa left the Louvre was in 1974, when it was exhibited in Japan. As a token of gratitude for the opportunity to see the legendary creation of Leonardo, the Japanese gave the Paris Museum thick glass, which now reliably protects the painting in a bulletproof container. It has now been decided that the Mona Lisa will never again leave the walls of the Louvre - the risk of the painting being stolen or damaged is too great. It is stored at a constant temperature of 68 degrees Fahrenheit with 55 percent humidity. The container has a built-in air conditioner and nine pounds of silicone desiccant to maintain a constant level of air humidity. The container is opened once a year to check the picture itself and the operation of the air conditioner. Until now, no one has dared to wipe the painting for fear of damaging it. The colors under the layer of dust are probably brighter than they seem to us now.

The painting by Leonardo da Vinci "Mona Lisa" is the first thing tourists from any country associate with the Louvre. This is the most famous and mysterious work of painting in the history of world art. Her mysterious smile still makes people think and fascinate people who do not like or are not interested in painting. And the story of her abduction at the beginning of the 20th century turned the picture into a living legend. But first things first.

History of the painting

"Mona Lisa" is just an abbreviated name for the painting. In the original, it sounds like “Portrait of Mrs. Lisa Giocondo” (Ritratto di Monna Lisa del Giocondo). From Italian, the word ma donna is translated as "my lady." Over time, it turned into simply mona, from which the well-known name of the painting came.

The biographers of the artist's contemporaries wrote that he rarely took orders, but the Mona Lisa initially had a special story. He devoted himself to work with a special passion, spent almost all his time writing it and took it with him to France (Leonardo left Italy forever) along with other selected paintings.

It is known that the artist began the painting in 1503-1505, and only in 1516 he applied the last stroke, shortly before his death. According to the will, the painting was given to Leonardo's student, Salai. It remains unknown how the painting migrated back to France (most likely Francis I acquired it from Salai's heirs). During the time of Louis XIV, the painting moved to the Palace of Versailles, and after the French Revolution, the Louvre became its permanent home.

There is nothing special in the history of creation, the lady with a mysterious smile in the picture is of more interest. Who is she?

According to the official version, this is a portrait of Lisa del Giocondo, the young wife of Francesco del Giocondo, a prominent Florentine silk merchant. Very little is known about Lisa: she was born in Florence to a noble family. She married early and led a calm, measured life. Francesco del Giocondo was a great admirer of art and painting and patronized artists. It was he who came up with the idea to order a portrait of his wife in honor of the birth of their first child. There is a hypothesis that Leonardo was in love with Lisa. This can explain his special attachment to the picture and the long time he worked on it.

This is surprising, almost nothing is known about the life of Liza herself, and her portrait is the main work of world painting.

But contemporary historians of Leonardo are not so unambiguous. According to Giorgio Vasari, the model could be Caterina Sforza (representative of the ruling dynasty of the Italian Renaissance, considered the main woman of that era), Cecilia Gallerani (lover of Duke Ludovik Sforza, model of another portrait of a genius - “Lady with an Ermine”), the artist’s mother, Leonardo himself , a young man in women's attire and just a portrait of a woman - the standard of beauty of the Renaissance.

Description of the picture

The canvas of a small size depicts a woman of medium size, in a dark cloak (according to historians - a sign of widowhood), sitting half-turned. Like other Italian Renaissance portraits, the Mona Lisa lacks eyebrows and shaves the top of her forehead. Most likely, the model posed on the balcony, as the line of the parapet is visible. It is believed that the picture is slightly cut off, the columns visible behind were completely included in the original size.

It is believed that the composition of the painting is the standard of the portrait genre. It is painted according to all the laws of harmony and rhythm: the model is inscribed in a proportional rectangle, the wavy strand of hair is in tune with the translucent veil, and the folded hands give the picture a special compositional completeness.

Mona Lisa smile

This phrase has long been living separately from the picture, turning into a literary cliché. This is the main mystery and charm of the canvas. It attracts the attention of not only ordinary viewers and art historians, but also psychologists. For example, Sigmund Freud calls her smile "flirtatious". And a special look is “fleeting”.

Current state

Due to the fact that the artist liked to experiment with paints and painting techniques, the picture has darkened very much by now. And its surface is formed strong cracks. One of them is a millimeter above the head of the Mona Lisa. In the middle of the last century, the canvas was sent on a "tour" to museums in the United States and Japan. Museum of Fine Arts. A.S. Pushkin was lucky enough to host a masterpiece for the duration of the exhibition.

Fame of Mona Lisa

The painting was very highly regarded among Leonardo's contemporaries, but over the decades it has become forgotten. Until the 19th century, she was not remembered until the moment when the romantic writer Theophile Gauthier spoke about the “La Gioconda smile” in one of his literary works. Strange, but up to this point, this feature of the picture was simply called “pleasant” and there was no secret in it.

The painting gained real popularity among the general public in connection with its mysterious abduction in 1911. Newspaper hype around this story gained huge popularity for the picture. It was possible to find her only in 1914, where she was all this time - remains a mystery. Her abductor was Vinchezo Perugio, an employee of the Louvre, an Italian by nationality. The exact motives for the kidnapping are unknown, probably he wanted to bring the canvas to his historical homeland of Leonardo, Italy.

Mona Lisa today

"Mona Lisa" still "lives" in the Louvre, she, as the main artistic prima, has been allocated a separate room in the museum. She suffered several times from vandalism, after which in 1956 she was placed in bulletproof glass. Because of this, it glares strongly, so it is sometimes problematic to see it. Nevertheless, it is she who attracts most visitors to the Louvre with her smile and fleeting glance.

Mona Lisa, of course, is not only the most significant, successful and popular work of the Renaissance master da Vinci, but also his most discussed creation.

Analysis

The work template itself is extremely revolutionary, especially in the technique of realizing the portrait. Leonardo refused to use a clean background, as he had done before. The location of the figure from the waist, the position of the hands is an absolute novelty. Although it may seem paradoxical, there is movement in this picture. The background shrouded in mist, the bridge over the river, the colors used by the artist create a feeling of naturalness and liveliness. It is assumed that a slight blur of the figure reflects the heartbeat of the heroine. The author also uses the author's sfumato technique in his work, creating a haze effect.

Framed work

One of the elements of the work that touches all viewers is Mona Lisa's smile, known all over the world. The smile is on the verge of recognition. Its presence and form varies depending on the points of observation. It is believed that she, for all her mystery, embodies the impossibility of finding a foothold in human feelings.

Leonardo transforms this portrait into an ideal image, paying special attention to his own vision of reality and nature, which are never in a static position, on the contrary, they are dynamic and alive.

Interpretations and symbolism

There is an assumption that the picture depicts an androgynous lover Leonardo. Some scholars believe that the Mona Lisa is a self-portrait of the artist. The use of modern technologies made it possible to look under the outer layer of paints and see another portrait there, reminiscent of both the draft version of the Gioconda and the independent work. However, the Louvre staff and many experts are skeptical of many studies and do not comment on the main high-profile statements.

Gioconda - a picture that perfectly represents "poetry" Leonardo da Vinci: this work shows the personal experiences of the creator, the complexity of the universe in the smallest detail. The background behind Lisa Gherardini is done in an exceptional way: corrosion and rocks formed by rivers, with light filtering, create a landscape. One can trace the transformation of matter from solid to liquid and then to gaseous. The woman, as the subject of the composition, does not contradict this theme, but rather represents the last step in the evolution of this list.

Light in this work plays a fundamental role, it completely “embraces” the woman, creates sharp contrasts with dark fragments, and is also the subject of controversy.

Heritage

Entire books and scientific works are dedicated to Gioconda, the authors of which are trying to understand the content, but the work still hides many secrets. "Mona Lisa" has generated a lot of controversy and talk, still remaining one of the most popular paintings in the history of art. The elusiveness of nature and the human soul, as well as other symbolism, is still trying to be interpreted with the help of the mentioned smile, the colors and colors used, as well as modern technologies.

Painting "Mona Lisa" updated: October 25, 2017 by: Gleb

Painting Mona Lisa (Gioconda) of the Louvre Museum

The Mona Lisa (Gioconda) painting of the Louvre Museum is without a doubt a truly beautiful and priceless work of art, but the reasons for its incredible popularity must be explained.

It seems that the worldwide fame of this canvas is not due to its artistic merit, but to the disputes and secrets that accompanied the picture, as well as the special impact on males.

She liked it so much at the time. Napoleon Bonaparte that he moved it from the Louvre to the Tuileries Palace and hung it in his bedroom.

Mona Lisa is a simplified version of the spelling of the name “Mona Lisa”, which in turn is an abbreviation for the word madonna (“my lady”) - this is how the famous 16th-century historian Giorgio Vasari spoke with reverence about Lisa Gherardini depicted in the portrait in his book “Life eminent Italian architects, sculptors and painters.

This woman was married to a certain Francesco del Gioconda, it was thanks to this factor that the Italians, and after them the French, began to call the painting "Gioconda". However, there is no complete certainty that it is the Mona Lisa Gioconda that is depicted on the canvas. In the portrait that Vasari describes (although he himself never saw him), the woman has “thicker eyebrows in some places” (the Mona Lisa does not have them at all) and “the mouth is slightly open” (Mona Lisa smiles, but her mouth is closed) .

Another testimony comes from the secretary of Cardinal Louis of Aragon, the last person who met Leonardo da Vinci in France, where the artist spent his last years at the court of the monarch Francis I in Amboise.

It appears that Leonardo showed the Cardinal several paintings he had brought with him from Italy, including "a portrait of a Florentine woman painted from life." That's all the information that can be used to identify the Mona Lisa (La Gioconda) painting.

It represents a fairly large range of possibilities for all sorts of alternative versions, amateur speculation and challenging the authorship of possible copies of the painting and other works by Leonardo da Vinci.

We can only say with certainty that the "Mona Lisa" was found in the bathroom Palace of Fontainebleau, which King Henry IV planned to restore in the 1590s. For a long time, no one paid attention to the picture: neither the public nor art connoisseurs, until finally, after a 70-year stay in the Louvre in Paris, the famous writer and poet Theophile Gautier, who at that time was compiling a guide to the Louvre, saw her.

Gauthier highly appreciated the picture and called it “delightful Gioconda”: ​​“A sensual smile always plays on the lips of this woman, she seems to be mocking her many admirers. Her serene face expresses confidence that she will always be amazing and beautiful.

A few years later, the indelible impression that the Gioconda painting made on Gauthier became even deeper, and he was able to finally formulate the peculiarity of this masterpiece: “her sinuous, serpentine mouth, the corners of which are raised up in the lilac penumbra, laughs at you with such grace, tenderness and the superiority that, looking at her, we are shy, like schoolchildren in the presence of a noble lady.

In the UK, the picture became known in 1869 thanks to the prose writer Walter Pater. He wrote: This feeling, which in such a strange way arises near the water, expresses what men have been striving for for millennia ...

This woman is older than the rocks she is near; like a vampire, she had already died many times and learned the secrets of the underworld, she plunged into the abyss of the sea and kept the memory of it. Together with eastern merchants, she went for the most amazing fabrics, she was Leda, the mother of Elena the Beautiful, and Saint Anna, the mother of Mary, and all this happened to her, but was preserved only as the sound of a lyre or flute and was reflected in the exquisite oval of the face, in the outlines eyelids and hand position.

When on August 21, 1911 the Mona Lisa painting was stolen by an Italian guard, and soon found in December 1913, the "prima donna" Renaissance was given a separate place in the Louvre Museum.

Criticism and shortcomings of the canvas Mona Lisa (La Gioconda)

A little later, in 1919, the Dadaist Marcel Duchamp bought a cheap postcard with a reproduction of the canvas, drew a beard on it and signed the letters “L.H.O.O.Q” on the bottom, which in French read almost like elle a chaud au cul, meaning something like “she is hot.” girl." Since then, the glory of Leonardo da Vinci's painting has lived its own life, despite numerous protests from outraged art critics.

For example, Bernard Berenson at one time expressed the following opinion: “... (she) is in an unpleasant way different from all the women I have ever known or dreamed of, a foreigner who is difficult to understand, cunning, wary, self-confident, filled with a sense of hostile superiority, with a smile of anticipation of pleasure.

Roberto Longhi said that he prefers women from Renoir's paintings to this "nondescript nervous woman". However, despite all this, many more photographers gather near the portrait of Mona Lisa every day than near the most famous film stars at the annual Oscar ceremonies. Also, attention to the Mona Lisa increased significantly after she appeared as an episodic character in Dan Brown's sensational book The Da Vinci Code.

However, it should be noted that the name "Mona Lisa" is not a coded version of "Amon L" Iza, a combination of the names of the ancient Egyptian fertility gods Amon and Isis. In other words, Mona Lisa (La Gioconda) cannot be interpreted as an expression of a bisexual "female deity". after all, the name Mona Lisa is just the English name for a painting by Leonardo da Vinci, a name that didn't exist at the time the painting was made.

Perhaps there is some truth in the fact that the Mona Lisa is just a self-portrait of Leonardo in a woman's dress. Experts know that the painter really liked to paint bisexual figures, which is why some art critics saw a similarity between the proportions of the face in the picture and the sketch of Leonardo da Vinci's self-portrait.

These days, a painting by Leonardo da Vinci does not make any impression on many visitors at all. the Louvre Museum, as well as Roberto Longhi or the heroine of Dan Brown's book, Sophie Neve, who generally believed that this picture was "too small" and "dark".

The canvas of Leonardo really has very small dimensions, namely 53 by 76 centimeters, and in general it looks quite dark. In truth, it is simply dirty, because while most of the reproductions have “corrected” the original colors of the painting, not a single restorer has dared to offer to “correct” the original.

However, sooner or later, the Louvre Museum in Paris will still have to deal with the restoration of the Mona Lisa (La Gioconda), because, according to the restorers, the thin base of poplar wood on which it is painted will deform over time and will not last long.

In the meantime, the glass frame of the painting, designed by a Milanese company, helps to preserve the canvas. If you manage to get through the crowds of visitors, as well as through the plaque of glory, the dirt of centuries and your own wrong expectations from the picture, you will end up with a beautiful and unique creation of painting.

"Mona Lisa", she is "La Gioconda", full name - Portrait of Mrs. Lisa del Giocondo, - a painting by Leonardo da Vinci, located in the Louvre (Paris, France), one of the most famous paintings in the world, which is considered to be portrait of Lisa Gherardini, wife of the Florentine silk merchant Francesco del Giocondo, painted around 1503-1505.

History of the painting

Even the first Italian biographers of Leonardo da Vinci wrote about the place that this painting occupied in the artist's work. Leonardo did not shy away from working on the Mona Lisa - as was the case with many other orders, but, on the contrary, gave herself to her with some kind of passion. She devoted all the time that remained with him from work on the Battle of Anghiari. He spent considerable time on it and, leaving Italy in adulthood, he took with him to France, among some other selected paintings. Da Vinci had a special affection for this portrait, and also thought a lot during the process of its creation, in the "Treatise on Painting" and in those notes on painting technique that were not included in it, you can find many indications that undoubtedly refer to the "Gioconda ".

Model identification problem

In the information about the identity of the woman in the picture, uncertainty remained for a long time and many versions were expressed:

• Caterina Sforza, illegitimate daughter of the Duke of Milan, Galeazzo Sforza

Caterina Sforza

• Isabella of Aragon, Duchess of Milan

The work of a follower of Leonardo is an image of a saint. Perhaps, Isabella of Aragon, Duchess of Milan, one of the candidates for the role of Mona Lisa, is captured in her appearance.

• Cecilia Gallerani (model of another portrait of the artist - "Ladies with an Ermine")

The work of Leonardo da Vinci, "Lady with an Ermine".

• Constanza d'Avalos, which had the nickname "Merry", that is, La Gioconda in Italian. In 1925, the Italian art critic Venturi suggested that the Gioconda is a portrait of the Duchess of Costanza d'Avalos, the widow of Federigo del Balzo, sung in a short poem by Eneo Irpino, which also mentions her portrait painted by Leonardo. Costanza was the mistress of Giuliano de' Medici.

• Pacifica Brandano is another mistress of Giuliano Medici, the mother of Cardinal Ippolito Medici (According to Roberto Zapperi, the portrait of Pacifica was commissioned by Giuliano Medici for an illegitimate son legalized by him later, who longed to see his mother, who had already died by this time. At the same time, according to the art critic, the customer , as usual, left for Leonardo complete freedom of action).

• Isabela Gualanda

• Just the perfect woman

• A young man in a woman's attire (for example, Salai, beloved of Leonardo)

Salai in Leonardo's drawing

• Self portrait of Leonardo da Vinci

According to one of the put forward versions, "Mona Lisa" is a self-portrait of the artist

Leonardo da Vinci

• Retrospective portrait of the artist's mother Katerina (proposed by Freud, then by Serge Bramly, Rina de "Firenze, Roni Kempler, and others).

However, the version about the correspondence of the generally accepted name of the painting to the personality of the model in 2005 is considered to have found final confirmation. Scientists from the University of Heidelberg studied the notes on the margins of a tome owned by a Florentine official, a personal acquaintance of the artist Agostino Vespucci. In notes on the margins of the book, he compares Leonardo with the famous ancient Greek painter Apelles and notes that "now da Vinci is working on three paintings, one of which is a portrait of Lisa Gherardini."

Marginal check proves correct identification of Mona Lisa model

Thus, Mona Lisa really turned out to be the wife of the Florentine merchant Francesco del Giocondo - Lisa Gherardini. The painting, as scholars prove in this case, was commissioned by Leonardo for the young family's new home and to commemorate the birth of their second son, named Andrea.

Description of the picture

The picture of a rectangular format depicts a woman in dark clothes, turning half-turned. She sits in an armchair with her hands clasped together, resting one hand on his armrest, and placing the other on top, turning in the chair almost to face the viewer. Separated by a parting, smoothly and flatly lying hair, visible through a transparent veil thrown over them (according to some assumptions, an attribute of widowhood), fall on the shoulders in two sparse, slightly wavy strands. A green dress in thin ruffles, with yellow pleated sleeves, cut out on a low white chest. The head is slightly turned.

Art historian Boris Vipper, describing the picture, points out that Mona Lisa's face shows traces of Quattrocento fashion: her eyebrows and hair on the top of her forehead are shaved.

The lower edge of the painting cuts off the second half of her body, so the portrait is almost half-length. The armchair in which the model sits stands on a balcony or on a loggia, the parapet line of which is visible behind her elbows. It is believed that earlier the picture could have been wider and accommodated two side columns of the loggia, from which at the moment there are two bases of columns, whose fragments are visible along the edges of the parapet.

A copy of the "Mona Lisa" from the Wallace Collection (Baltimore) was made before the edges of the original were trimmed, and allows you to see the lost columns.

The loggia overlooks a desolate wilderness of meandering streams and a lake surrounded by snowy mountains that extends to a high skyline behind the figure. “Mona Lisa is represented sitting in an armchair against the backdrop of a landscape, and the very comparison of her figure, which is very close to the viewer, with a landscape visible from afar, like a huge mountain, gives the image extraordinary grandeur. The same impression is facilitated by the contrast of the increased plastic tangibility of the figure and its smooth, generalized silhouette with a landscape receding into a foggy distance, like a vision, with bizarre rocks and water channels winding among them.

Current state

The Mona Lisa became very dark, which is considered the result of the author's tendency to experiment with paints, because of which the Last Supper fresco almost died. The artist's contemporaries, however, managed to express their enthusiasm not only about the composition, drawing and play of chiaroscuro - but also about the color of the work. It is assumed, for example, that initially the sleeves of her dress could be red - as can be seen from a copy of the painting from the Prado.

An early copy of the Mona Lisa from the Prado shows how much the portrait image loses when placed against a dark neutral background.

The current state of the painting is quite bad, which is why the Louvre staff announced that they would no longer give it to exhibitions: “Cracks have formed on the painting, and one of them stops a few millimeters above Mona Lisa’s head.”

Macro photography allows you to see a large number of craquelure (cracks) on the surface of the picture.

Technics

As Dzhivelegov notes, by the time of the creation of the Mona Lisa, Leonardo’s skill “has already entered a phase of such maturity, when all formal tasks of a compositional and other nature have been set and solved, when Leonardo began to think that only the last, most difficult tasks of artistic technique deserve to be to take care of them. And when he found in the face of Mona Lisa a model that satisfied his needs, he tried to solve some of the highest and most difficult tasks of painting technique that he had not yet solved. With the help of techniques that he had already developed and tried before, especially with the help of his famous sfumato, which had previously given extraordinary effects, he wanted to do more than he had done before: to create a living face of a living person and reproduce the features and expression of this face in such a way that they the inner world of man was revealed to the end.

Boris Whipper asks the question, “by what means is this spirituality achieved, this undying spark of consciousness in the image of Mona Lisa, then two main means should be named. One is a wonderful Leonard's sfumato. No wonder Leonardo liked to say that "modeling is the soul of painting." It is sfumato that creates the Mona Lisa's wet gaze, her smile, light as the wind, and the incomparable caressing softness of the touch of her hands. Sfumato is a subtle haze that envelops the face and figure, softening contours and shadows. Leonardo recommended for this purpose to place between the source of light and the bodies, as he puts it, "a kind of fog."

Rotenberg writes that “Leonardo managed to bring into his creation that degree of generalization that allows us to consider him as an image of a Renaissance person as a whole. This high degree of generalization is reflected in all the elements of the pictorial language of the picture, in its individual motifs - in how a light, transparent veil, covering the head and shoulders of Mona Lisa, combines the carefully drawn strands of hair and small folds of the dress into a common smooth contour; it is palpable in the modeling of the face, incomparable in its gentle softness (on which the eyebrows were removed in the fashion of that time) and beautiful well-groomed hands.

Alpatov adds that “in a softly melting haze enveloping the face and figure, Leonardo managed to make one feel the boundless variability of human facial expressions. Although the eyes of the Gioconda look attentively and calmly at the viewer, due to the shading of her eye sockets, one might think that they are slightly frowning; her lips are compressed, but barely perceptible shadows are outlined near their corners, which make you believe that every minute they will open, smile, speak. The very contrast between her gaze and the half-smile on her lips gives an idea of ​​the inconsistency of her experiences. ... Leonardo worked on it for several years, ensuring that not a single sharp stroke, not a single angular contour remained in the picture; and although the edges of objects in it are clearly perceptible, they all dissolve in the subtlest transitions from penumbra to half-light.

Landscape

Art critics emphasize the naturalness with which the artist combined the portrait characteristics of a person with a landscape full of special mood, and how much this increased the dignity of the portrait.

Vipper considers the landscape the second means that creates the spirituality of the picture: “The second means is the relationship between the figure and the background. The fantastic, rocky, as if seen through the sea water landscape in the portrait of Mona Lisa has some other reality than her figure itself. The Mona Lisa has the reality of life, the landscape has the reality of a dream. Thanks to this contrast, the Mona Lisa seems so incredibly close and tangible, and we perceive the landscape as the radiance of her own dream.”

Renaissance art researcher Viktor Grashchenkov writes that Leonardo, including thanks to the landscape, managed to create not a portrait of a specific person, but a universal image: “In this mysterious picture, he created something more than a portrait image of the unknown Florentine Mona Lisa, the third wife of Francesco del Giocondo. The appearance and mental structure of a particular person are conveyed to them with unprecedented syntheticity. This impersonal psychologism corresponds to the cosmic abstraction of the landscape, almost completely devoid of any signs of human presence. In smoky chiaroscuro, not only all the outlines of the figure and landscape and all color tones are softened. In the most subtle transitions, almost imperceptible to the eye, from light to shadow, in the vibration of Leonard's "sfumato" softens to the limit, melts and is ready to disappear any certainty of individuality and its psychological state. ... "La Gioconda" is not a portrait. This is a visible symbol of the very life of man and nature, united into one whole and presented abstractly from their individual concrete form. But behind the barely noticeable movement, which, like light ripples, runs through the motionless surface of this harmonious world, one can guess all the richness of the possibilities of physical and spiritual existence.

In 2012, a copy of the "Mona Lisa" from the Prado was cleared, and a landscape background appeared under the later recordings - the feeling of the canvas immediately changes.

"Mona Lisa" is sustained in golden brown and reddish tones of the foreground and emerald green tones of the distance. “Transparent as glass, paints form an alloy, as if created not by a human hand, but by that inner force of matter, which from a solution gives rise to crystals perfect in shape.” Like many of Leonardo's works, this work has darkened with time, and its color ratios have changed somewhat, but even now the thoughtful juxtapositions in the tones of carnation and clothing and their general contrast with the bluish-green, "underwater" tone of the landscape are clearly perceived.

Theft

Mona Lisa would have long been known only to connoisseurs of fine art, if not for her exceptional history, which ensured her worldwide fame.

On August 21, 1911, the painting was stolen by an employee of the Louvre, the Italian mirror master Vincenzo Perugia. The purpose of this kidnapping is not clear. Perhaps Perugia wanted to return the Gioconda to its historical homeland, believing that the French had “kidnapped” it and forgetting that Leonardo himself brought the painting to France. A search by the police turned up nothing. The country's borders were closed, the museum administration was fired. The poet Guillaume Apollinaire was arrested on suspicion of committing a crime and later released. Pablo Picasso was also under suspicion. The picture was found only two years later in Italy - and the thief himself was to blame for this, responding to an ad in a newspaper and offering to sell the Gioconda to the director of the Uffizi Gallery. It is assumed that he was going to make copies and pass them off as the original. Perugia, on the one hand, was praised for Italian patriotism, on the other hand, they gave him a short term in prison.

Vincenzo Perugia. Sheet from the criminal case.

In the end, on January 4, 1914, the painting (after exhibitions in Italian cities) returned to Paris. During this time, "Mona Lisa" did not leave the covers of newspapers and magazines around the world, as well as postcards, so it is not surprising that the "Mona Lisa" was copied more than all other paintings. The painting became an object of worship as a masterpiece of world classics.

Vandalism

In 1956, the lower part of the painting was damaged when a visitor poured acid on it. On December 30 of the same year, the young Bolivian Hugo Ungaza Villegas threw a stone at her and damaged the paint layer at the elbow (the loss was later recorded). After that, the Mona Lisa was protected by bulletproof glass, which protected her from further serious attacks. Yet in April 1974, a woman, frustrated by the museum's policy regarding the disabled, tried to spray red paint from a spray can when the painting was on display in Tokyo, and on April 2, 2009, a Russian woman who did not receive French citizenship launched a clay cup into the glass. Both of these cases did not harm the picture.

Crowd in the Louvre at the painting, today.