Younger, happier Mona Lisa painted 10 years earlier, experts believe

Discovery News via FoxNews ^ | September 27, 2012 | Discovery News

[jmcenanly]

Leonardo da Vinci painted a younger and happier Mona Lisa some 10 years before painting the famous painting, art experts are claiming. Slightly larger in size than the famous portrait,‭ ‬which now hangs in the Louvre in Paris,‭ ‬the painting features‭ ‬a darker tonality,‭ ‬a different and unfinished background framed by two columns,‭ ‬and‭ ‬shows a younger lady with a less enigmatic smile. Known as the Isleworth Mona Lisa,‭ ‬the artwork will be unveiled in Geneva on Thursday by the Mona Lisa Foundation,‭ ‬a Zurich‭-based consortium which has‭ ‬kept the painting in a Swiss bank vault for‭ ‬40‭ ‬years.

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[Gatún(CraigIsaMangoTreeLawyer)]

Wearing the same dress?

[GeronL]

the Mona Lisa in the Louvre is the fake, lol. That’d be a kick in the pants wouldn’t it?

[The Great RJ]

Perhaps painted by Leonardo’s less talented older brother Ralph. (satire)

[angcat]

LOL
This would sell for millions.

[Ditter]

I have painted the same thing, (scene, person, dog) over several times trying to do it better. I doubt if they are 10 years apart, if in fact DaVinci did both of them.

Artist worked in groups back then called ateliers (sp?) One experienced painter or teacher and his students. Maybe a student did this new one at the same time that Davince did his because the model is wearing the same dress. Whatever...... we will never know.... I like the new one better anyway.

One of the big disappointments in my life was finally getting to Paris to see the Mona Lisa and being disappointed because it is small and gloomy and ugly.

[Sacajaweau]

My son said the same thing after visiting the Louvre....That you walk down a corridor that lasts forever and at the end is this little "renowned" painting which is hardly "great".

You paint things over and over???...

Davinci was an impatient "sketcher"...with only a few paintings to his name.

[Sacajaweau]

I’m now inclined to believe that NEITHER is a Davinci....That the existence of two, disproves the other.

[Ditter]

I remember looking at the MonaLisa and saying under my breath “is that all there is?” LOL!

Not always do I paint things over, sometimes I get it right the first time and that is the best but I have painted things over more than once or twice.

I also take failed paintings and paint over them and reuse the canvas/board for a totally different painting. All artist do this. There might be a failed painting under every success. :)

[Buckeye McFrog]

I thought this would have been a nude.

“I was young and I needed the money” or somesuch...

[Sacajaweau]

Davincis John the Baptist looks more like the young Mona Lisa...

The problem remains...the one in the louve is on poplar wood, the young lisa is on canvas.

There was a nude painted of Mona by Salail??? whom Davinci did not like.

[Calvin Locke]

I recently read "The Rescue Artist" about the recovery of "The Scream" that was stolen during the 1994 Lillehammer games.

Can't remember the time-frame but Munch painted something like a half dozen or so "Screams". One of which, was displayed as "The Scream", and stolen again...

FWIW, the book is interspersed with a number of art theft stories, including the "Mona Lisa".

IIRC, its theft by a janitor was so that some con artist could sell fakes for big bucks to rich idiots. The painting's theft generated the needed publicity to con the buyers that each mark was getting the original. The crook also shafted the janitor, BTW, who eventually got off fairly easy, being an Italian "wishing to repatriate the art..."

[Casie]

I was surprised by your post! Thanks for sharing that! Its fascinating to think that Mona isn't as impressive in person.

On the other hand, I never really appreciated the impressionists paintings by Monet, Van Gogh, Degas... until I saw a collection of them at the Sheaves Of Wheat show in Dallas. I was blown away by the scale and color and complete unedited enthusiasm of the brush strokes. I just had no idea! Dorm room posters and internet pictures just can not show you the wild colors, the thickness in which the layers of paint are applied and the dizzying motion that the textures create! And I'm the type of girl that usually just says things like, "Nice picture. I like that frame." Haha!

[Calvin Locke]

...and paint over them and reuse the canvas/board for a totally different painting.

"Monet's unknown masterpiece, Dogs At Cards."

[afraidfortherepublic]

Personally, I think it’s a fake made by some talented art forger. It is inconceivable that a second work would lie around unnoticed for this long given the notariety of Da Vinci and the Mona Lisa.

Neil Caffrey comes to mind...("White Collar" reference)

[HomeAtLast]

Reminds me of the work of that art forger who did the Vermeers so well.

[Ditter]

Possibly but if Monet had though it was a masterpiece he wouldn’t have painted those dogs over it. I trust Monet’s judgment. :)

[Ditter]

There is a circular room in a famous Paris art museum not the Louver (can't think of the name right now) and the walls, floor to ceiling, are all Monet's waterlillies all around the room. It is so fabulous, it took my breath away.

[Calvin Locke]

Michelangelo’s discarded marbles gives me pause as to “what was he thinking?” when he decided to stop working the stone.

[Casie]

"There is a circular room in a famous Paris art museum not the Louver (can't think of the name right now) and the walls, floor to ceiling, are all Monet's waterlillies all around the room. It is so fabulous, it took my breath away."

Ah! That sounds amazing!

[Ruy Dias de Bivar]

I had the pleasure of seeing Cabanel’s THE BIRTH OF VENUS in the Met in NYC this year. I found it was a copy of his own work which he was paid to reproduce. His original is in the Mus’ee d’Orsay, Paris.

About 45 years ago there was an article in one of our major news magazines (I can’t remember which one was) about other copies of the Mona Lisa which may have been done by Leonardo or his students. One was in a bank vault in Virginia for safekeeping.