Comparing Portraits	Mona Lisa	My Favorite Portrait	PortraitQuest Home
		The Mona Lisa (a.k.a. La Gioconda) was painted by widely acclaimed Renaissance artist, Leonardo da Vinci, from 1503 to 1506. Many people consider the Mona Lisa the most memorable painting of all time. The painting does not look very interesting-just a paining of a woman in a black dress. Why does everybody think it is so great? For starters, there is her mysterious smile-what is she smiling about? Is she truly happy? There are her eyes that seem to follow a person everywhere. There are the very advanced painting techniques involved- "sfumato", "chiaroscuro", "pyramidal composition"… the knowledge and skill required to paint it could only have belonged to Leonardo himself. Yet, the real allure of the Mona Lisa is the mystery surrounding it. Nobody knows whom the model for the Mona Lisa was-some theories include merchant Lisa Gherardini del Gioconda, Leonardo’s mother, and himself in drag. The Da Vinci Code, a recent bestseller novel, offers the theory that the Mona Lisa was a call for equality between the sexes and that its name is an anagram of the Egyptian gods Amon and L’isa, of male and female fertility. The book fails to mention the "Da Vinci" was not Leonardo’s real last name or that the painting was originally called "Monna Lisa". There is also a theory that the Mona Lisa is so appealing because of the natural way the eye works. As the eye focuses on different parts of the painting, the "sfumato" technique changes the way the mouth looks. In other words, the Mona Lisa is appealing because she is whatever the viewer wants her to be, with an ambiguous expression, shadowy techniques and a mountain of speculation. Onlookers see a little bit of themselves in the Mona Lisa, and this is why it has endured all these years.
Monna Lisa, Leonardo Da Vinci, 1506