Mona Lisa (Italian: La Gioconda, French: La Joconde)
Leonardo da Vinci, circa 1503–1506
Musée du Louvre, Paris (Source: Wikipedia)

Leonardo Da Vinci's Legacy

This weeks' world of art headlines included this story buzzing through the wires on Reuters on Monday, January 14, 2008:

"German experts crack Mona Lisa smile"

Evidently, the age-old mystery of just who this famous painted lady is has some decidedly new light. Here's a snippet from the story:

German experts crack Mona Lisa smile

By Sylvia Westall

BERLIN (Reuters) - German academics believe they have solved the centuries-old mystery behind the identity of the "Mona Lisa" in Leonardo da Vinci's famous portrait.

Lisa Gherardini, the wife of a wealthy Florentine merchant, Francesco del Giocondo, has long been seen as the most likely model for the sixteenth-century painting.

But art historians have often wondered whether the smiling woman may actually have been da Vinci's lover, his mother or the artist himself.

Now experts at the Heidelberg University library say dated notes scribbled in the margins of a book by its owner in October 1503 confirm once and for all that Lisa del Giocondo was indeed the model for one of the most famous portraits in the world.

"All doubts about the identity of the Mona Lisa have been eliminated by a discovery by Dr. Armin Schlechter," a manuscript expert, the library said in a statement on Monday. ...

Once and for all? I wonder. It seems that even when experts step up with their new discoveries, research, and experted words some will still say, "Yes, but..."

There is a thrive to keep mystery alive in some circles. The love of debate and the twistery of mystery keeps creativity flowing in story-telling, book-writing, and Hollywood moving-making. What is reality? What is truth? Perhaps the answer to those can also be found in Lisa del Giocondo's smile. •

Want to know what else you can learn from Leonardo? Unravel the twistery of mystery here »

© 2008 Chris Dunmire www.chrisdunmire.com. All rights reserved.