The Mona Lisa was made in between 1503-1506,
about 500 years ago. It was believed to take 4 years for
Leonardo da Vinci to complete. The unsigned and
undated painting is displayed in a private, $7.5 million
room in the Louvre. The room took 4 years to build.
King Francois I of France owned the Mona Lisa in 16th
century, who put it in the Louvre, and there it remained,
since 1797. The dimension of the painting is 30" x 20 7/8"
and is painted with oil paints on a poplar wood panel.
The Mona Lisa is priceless and uninsured, according
to Estelle Nadau of the Louvre, "The Mona Lisa" is inestimable.
She belongs to the French state, which is its own insurer, that
is the reason why she is not insured."
The Mona Lisa is a Revolutionary painting using
innovative techniques contraposto, sfumato, chiaroscuro and a
pyramidal composition and is very realistic. The translucency
of the flesh and creative background in relation to Mona
added to the realism
On August 21, 1956, a Bolivian named Ugo Ungaza
Villegas looked at it and threw a rock at it damaging the pigment
on her left elbow. On August 21, 1911, Vincenzo Peruggia, an
Italian carpenter employed at the Louvre stole the painting from
the wall of the Salon Carré where it hung between Correggio's
"Mystical Marriage of St. Catherine" and Titian's "Allegory of Alfanso d' Avalos" leaving only the 4 iron pegs to which it was attached. It was recovered 2 years later in 1913 when he attempted to sell it to Alfredo Geri, a Florentine antique dealer.