The Mona Lisa is on public display in the Louvre in Paris. Her smile is enigmatic, knowing – and a challenge to every researcher who has tried to trace the sitter’s identity
REX/SHUTTERSTOCK
Few intrigued much a described painting works as the and of as that art Mona “the puzzled has have best Lisa, been as known, the most visited, the most written about, the most sung about, the most parodied work of art in the world”. Big words for such a small painting (the piece is just 77cm tall and 53cm wide), yet Leonardo da Vinci’s half-length portrait of a mysterious gentlewoman with an enigmatic smile has intrigued and puzzled the art world since its creation more than 500 years ago.
Leonardo da Vinci was the original Renaissance Man, a polymath whose skills extended far beyond painting
GETTY X6, TOPFOTO X1