by Christopher Hessman
Unarguably, the most famous picture in the world, bar none, is the famed Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci. Generations of art fanciers and scholars of repute (and otherwise) have looked long and hard at this masterwork... all wondering, and then pontificating, about who "she" was... and what that provoking, enigmatic half smile could mean.
Now in the latest news from Rome, researcher Silvano Vinceti has his say. After prolonged research, Vinceti says, with the ringing assurance of every da Vinci investigator, that the Mona Lisa is not in fact the wife of Francesco di Bartolommeo di Zanobi del Giocondo (whew!) but his male lover Gian Giacomo Caprotti, known as Salai.
Salai, who was a bit of a dish, worked for da Vinci for more than two decades, starting in 1490 when da Vinci was 38. During this time the master no doubt relied on his helper for many things; being a male model masquerading as a lady of quality was no doubt just one.
Salai also appears in such da Vinci masterpieces as "St. John the Baptist" (painted 1514) and a lesser-known drawing called "Angel Incarnate."
It's easy to see why da Vinci, with his predilections and trained connoisseur's eye, dallied with Salai. In the drawing of St. John the Baptist, Salai's youthful charms appear to full advantage. The flesh is radiant. Salai's body is young, firm, ripe; the muscles (which the master must have known so well) swell. The image pulsates with sensuality. Here was a most desirable hunk indeed. And the picture? Was it perhaps a souvenir, designed to remind? Or did it torment da Vinci after his young lover was gone? If so, it could have been called "Mi Ricordo", "I remember." Old men so recall the lovers of their lives, often painfully, especially when those lovers are young, slender, alluring... once at hand, now gone.
"The Angel Incarnate" (dated by experts between 1513-1515) is even more revealing, bluntly sexual (not merely sensual as the St. John) with engorged, thrusting member. Salai was proud, preening, sure of his power over the aging da Vinci. Perhaps the master liked it so. Others found it less enthralling; some outraged Puritan along the way tried vigorously to efface the bulging genitalia. No doubt da Vinci would, as a lover, have found the attempt amusing; as an artist he would have been outraged, and rightly so. Genius has its privileges.
Was this Salai? Was Salai da Vinci's lover? Or was he just a favorite, oggled and desired? Only the principal parties know for sure... just as only they know about the true identity of the Mona Lisa.
Researcher Vinceti is sure he has the answer... but then generations of devoted da Vinci admirers and researchers have been equally confident. Still...
Vicenti points to the similarities between Salai's nose and mouth in the three pictures; they are "striking" he asserts. No doubt in real life there were also worthy of note. One wonders whether da Vinci lingered over that mouth... and what he thought as he shaped this most enigmatic feature on his signature work.
Commenced in 1503, scrutinized and debated ever since.
Everything about the Mona Lisa has fascinated the cognoscenti since da Vinci first put brush to surface in Florence. For instance, it took the master 4 years to paint. It's painted on poplar wood, 77 x 53 cm. This wood now shows evidence of warping and was stabilized in 1951 with the addition of an oak frame and in 1970 with four vertical braces. Dovetails also were added, to prevent the widening of a small visible crack. These facts are not in dispute.
What is also indisputable are these facts:
Item: Mona Lisa has neither price nor insurance. It belongs to the French state and, priceless, has no assigned worth.
Item: It has hung in the private quarters of kings and emperors. Specifically, Mona Lisa was sold to French King Francis I (reigned 1515-1547) and was kept in the Louvre until Napoleon moved it to his state bedroom in the Tuileries. Hitler wanted to move it to Berlin... but was persuaded that that act of pillage would rouse the French like nothing else. They liked to pillage, too, but thought that capturing artistic trophies and moving them to Paris increased their value and eclat. How very French.
Item: It has been stolen. August 21, 1911, Vincenzo Peruggia, an Italian carpenter, made the classic error of confusing fame with salability. He seized the painting from the Salon Carrre of the Louvre, only to be arrested when he put this icon up for sale 2 years later to a Florence antiques dealer. If "Antiques Road Show" had existed then, he no doubt would have claimed to have found it at a yard sale.
Item: It has been defaced. On December 30, 1956, a Bolivian named Ugo Ungaza Villegas, stared at the picture for a time; then, having seen enough, threw a rock at it, damaging a speck of pigment near her left elbow, and thereby entering history.
Item: It has been damaged by chemicals. In 1956, an acid attempt damaged the lower half of the picture. The restoration took several, very expensive years.
These are the facts... all the rest is the stuff of pleasurable speculation and debates, for drawing rooms and international conferences.
The grand thing about the Mona Lisa, perhaps the very grandest, is that everything else except the price of her habitation in the Louvre ($7.5 million) cannot be known for sure. Even the attribution to da Vinci (while unchallenged) might be questioned since there is no signature. This is why your guess about such matters might be as good as the experts, and makes it inevitable you will go to Paris to see it, no doubt having to elbow your way through a legion of Japanese school children to get the best possible view.
Next time you go, while considering that the Mona Lisa may well be a lady of the early 16th century, also ponder the likelihood that the image may be of the master himself (some experts do say so).... or that it a fanciful, deliberately perplexing image of his young lover, the kind of boy who beguiled, entranced, disappointed and broke your heart... but who knew (at last) that that lover had given him the gift of eternity, a fact which no doubt delighted him... and which cheered his lonely old age, when he was neither young nor beautiful, but merely immortal.
About The Author
Harvard-educated Dr. Jeffrey Lant is CEO of Worldprofit, Inc., where small and home-based businesses learn how to profit online. Dr. Lant is also a historian and author of 18 best-selling business books. Republished with author's permission by Christopher Hessman http://ProvenAutomatedBiz.com. Check out Auto Coupon Cash -> http://www.ProvenAutomatedBiz.com/?rd=vu4WQplG
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