Mona Lisa News Story

	Web Leonardo da Vinci Site

"After Five Centuries, Mona Lisa Still Gets the Star Treatment"

"Curator, Guides, Guards Work Around Celebrity of Smile; a Rare Day Off—to Move"

• On April 4, 2005, for the first time in three decades, visitors to the Louvre Museum could not see the Mona Lisa.
• Leonardo da Vinci's masterpiece last left the building on a trip to Japan in 1974 and, with her freshly renovated room about to reopen, may never leave again.
• The vast majority of tourists in Paris visit the Louvre, and more than ninety per cent of them go directly to the smiling visage of Lisa Gherardini.
• The Louvre fears irate crowds if visitors turn up to find an apology hanging from the Mona Lisa's empty spot on the wall.
• The Mona Lisa's cult-like popularity presents special problems for the Louvre staff.
• Museum guides moan of tourists' monomania for the painting.
• Guards complain of constant noise, flashbulbs, and pickpockets in her room.
• The Mona Lisa requires special security in the wake of a theft and two attacks.
• Her room was renovated to handle an average of more than 1,500 visitors an hour.
• The Mona Lisa has become a prima donna who puts outrageous demands on her handlers.

Mona Lisa is still a smiling star

• The Mona Lisa was returned after four years, to her old room, which now boasts improved lighting, better crowd circulation, and special antireflection glass to protect her.
• The return was the latest leg of an eventful journey.
• Scholars believe that in 1503, wealthy Florentine merchant Francesco del Giocondo commissioned da Vinci to paint the Mona Lisa, his third wife, then 24.
• "Mona", short for madonna, is the Italian equivalent of "ma'am".
• Leonardo da Vinci spent almost four years applying oil paints and layers of varnish to a poplar-tree board.
• Why he never delivered the portrait remains unclear.
• In 1516, da Vinci moved to Amboise, France, and took the Mona Lisa painting with him.
• She remained there until he died in 1519.
• In 1798, during the French Revolution, Mona Lisa entered the Louvre, which was newly converted into a museum.
• In 1800, Napoleon "borrowed" Madame Lese for four years to hang in his bedrom.
• Early on August 21, 1911, Italian artist and Louvre employee, Vincenzo peruggia, removed the painting from its frame and walked out of the closed museum.
• Newspapers hyped the mysterious kidnapping.
• The painting's return in 1913, sparked celebrations in France and Italy, where Mr. Peruggia was caught and the Mona Lisa was rescued.
• Back in Paris, Mona Lisa's reputation soared, although problems continued.
• In 1956, an attacker threw acid at the painting.
• Several months later, an assailant threw a stone, it was then that the Louvre placed her behind glass.
• After visiting the United State in 1963 and in Tokyo for two months; she has been as firmly planted in Paris as the Eiffel Tower.