The Guardian has a good story on da Vinci's Mona Lisa and its odd appeal to just about every tourist who visits France. I remember studying the painting in Art Appreciation 101 in college and asking my professor what the big deal was, and he went off about the enigmatic smile and some such, but I never really understood why the painting was so darn famous. To wit:"People come because she is famous. Period," says Pete Brown, a retired businessman from Iowa, with some irritation. "But you want my opinion honestly? I'm not overly impressed."
Exactly. And that was my response when I visited the Louvre in 1995. I was cruising through the halls, ready to scream if I saw one more Virgin and Child painting, when I came upon a throng of tourists like myself buzzing around what appeared to be a small dark painting of an woman. And lo, there it was. And it was . . . anticlimactic. I suppose if I had listened to my art prof back home, the experience would have yielded more delight and culture. But the experience, given the world of hype surrounding the painting, was decidedly underwhelming. Perhaps the problem is the Louvre itself; you walk for hours among staggering works of art and sculpture, only to find the Mona Lisa, small and subtle, hanging on a random spot in a hall filled with hundreds of other works. I guess I expected it to have its own room, or even an entire wing of the museum, filled with art critics wearing berets whispering reverently and taking notes. Um, no.
So what did I do? Like any good tourist, I snapped a picture of the Mona Lisa. Except that I forgot to turn the flash off. And as the bright light illuminated the painting, probably ruining forever some delicate balance of color da Vinci spent a year perfecting, the crowd turned to me and gave me a look that could only say: You. Stupid. American.
And so I beat a hasty retreat and found a Virgin and Child by Correggio or Titian or somebody to console me, confident that I would never, and I mean never, understand the Mona Lisa.
