The Mona Lisa is arguably the world's most famous painting. This masterpiece was created by the Renaissance genius Leonardo Da Vinci. Yet the Mona Lisa continues to surprise everyone who sees her for the first time at the Louvre in Paris: at just 77 cm × 53 cm (30 inches × 21 inches), she's simply not large enough for most people's expectations.

Who Painted the Mona Lisa?

Leonardo Da Vinci began this artwork in 1503 in Florence, Italy, dedicating a full three years to its creation. This famous painting was commissioned by Italian businessman Francesco Del Giocondo and is believed to be a portrait of his wife, Lisa Gherardini. Today, the painting is known as "Mona Lisa" because "Mona" is a contraction of "Madonna," meaning "my lady."

The Mona Lisa was painted during the Renaissance period. The world has fallen in love with her, especially because of her enigmatic smile. Some say she's smiling, while others are certain she looks serious.

Although the "Mona Lisa" was a commissioned painting, Del Giocondo never received it. This was partly because Leonardo, despite working on it intermittently for at least three years, never considered it finished.

Leonardo da Vinci and Clos Lucé

In 1516, Leonardo was invited by King Francis I to work at the king's castle, Clos Lucé. Leonardo brought his Mona Lisa with him and likely continued working on the painting there. Leonardo worked at this location until his death in 1519. The Mona Lisa was still in his possession at that time. After his death, Leonardo's assistant, Salai, inherited the Mona Lisa along with Leonardo's other artworks.

King Francis purchased the painting for a modest sum and kept it at his castle in Fontainebleau until Louis XIV moved it to the Palace of Versailles. It remained there until the French Revolution at the end of the 18th century. Subsequently, it was moved to the world-famous Louvre museum, where it still hangs today. However, the painting has made several excursions in between.

Mona Lisa Damaged by Vandalism

Besides theft, the painting has been targeted by vandalism multiple times. In 1956, part of the work was damaged when someone threw acid on it. That same year, someone else threw a stone at the artwork. As a result, the Mona Lisa was placed behind glass. This prevented damage when a woman sprayed red paint on the painting in 1974, and again in 2009 when a Russian woman threw a teacup at it. The damage from the first two attacks was successfully restored.

Mona Lisa Value 2025

In 1962-1963, the Mona Lisa went on a world tour and was exhibited in many different museums. Prior to the tour, the painting was valued at approximately 100 million dollars. The tour was a massive success, with millions of people visiting museums to admire the Mona Lisa. Today, the painting is estimated to be worth 0.7 billion euros. This makes the Mona Lisa the most valuable painting in the world.

The 1999 Guinness Book of Records lists the Mona Lisa exhibited at the Louvre in Paris as the painting with the highest insured value: it was valued at $100 million on December 14, 1962, which corresponds to approximately $843 million in 2025, accounting for inflation.

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The Mona Lisa's Eyebrows Cause Confusion

But the new findings that have come to light about the Mona Lisa aren't about her size (or compactness), nor about her smile. It's about something entirely different: her eyebrows.

The Mona Lisa's eyebrows have been the subject of debate worldwide for centuries. Or rather, let's talk about her non-existent eyebrows.

During that era, it was a beauty ideal for women to have no eyebrows, and they would shave them off. According to this theory, the Mona Lisa herself removed her eyebrows, and da Vinci simply painted her as she was.

The Mona Lisa Copy

The great controversy: Did Da Vinci not look closely enough? It would make sense that da Vinci didn't give the Mona Lisa eyebrows in the portrait if she had indeed shaved them off. However, in 2012, another portrait of the Mona Lisa was discovered. It resembles the original Mona Lisa down to the last hair. Only one thing is different: the copy has eyebrows!

The copy of the Mona Lisa is believed to have been created by a student of da Vinci. It had remained hidden behind an overpainting for hundreds of years; restorers only uncovered the portrait in 2012. The student must have painted the young lady at approximately the same time as the great master, but his work shows more detail. Eyebrows, eyelashes, a lace trim, and so on. This contradicts the theory that the Mona Lisa had no eyebrows.

So did Leonardo Da Vinci simply not look carefully? Did he work hastily and miss all those details? No, not at all.

Da Vinci, What's the Deal with Eyebrows?

Researcher Pascal Cotte discovered through high-resolution scans that da Vinci probably did paint eyebrows on his beloved Mona Lisa. According to current research, there were also eyelashes and such. But these details have likely simply faded over time.

The Story of the Beautiful Mona Lisa

Leonardo da Vinci spent three years painting the Mona Lisa. To this day, the painting remains one of the most enigmatic paintings in the world.

Paralyzing horror spread among the staff of the Louvre in Paris. In the Salon Carré of the renowned art museum on August 22, 1911, only an empty rectangle could be found—right where Leonardo da Vinci's painting of the Mona Lisa had hung.

Although a detective was appointed as the new director of the Louvre, it initially remained a mystery how the 77 x 53 cm portrait could simply disappear. The previous day, a Monday, the building had been closed to the public for cleaning and maintenance.

During this time, numerous photographs were moved. When the 35 kg heavy wooden frame was discovered in a corner of the Louvre, it became clear that the thief had detached the painting panel and somehow smuggled it out of the building. There was no trace of the perpetrator, and this remained the case for the next two years.

This spectacular theft rekindled interest in one of the most enigmatic portraits in art history. Yet the oldest and most reliable tradition is very convincing. The painting depicts Lisa di Noldo Gherardini, born in 1479, the daughter of a Florentine manufacturer.

She was engaged at a young age to Giuliano de Medici, the youngest son of Lorenzo the Magnificent. At that time, the Medici family ruled over the entire territory around Florence. But in 1494, a religious uprising broke out here, and the Medicis were expelled from the city.

Giuliano also fled to King Charles VIII of France, who occupied Northern Italy with an invasion army. While Giuliano acquired the rank of duke in French service, poor Lisa was left alone and became pregnant in Florence. Finally, in 1495, the much older but very wealthy merchant Francesco del Giocondo took her in and married her.

In 1503, he commissioned a portrait of his wife from the famous universal genius Leonardo da Vinci. Leonardo, never a fast worker, struggled with the painting for three years, ultimately kept it, and took it with him to his French exile in 1517.

When a true cult around the painting emerged in the 19th century (the Italians called it Monna Lisa—Lady Lisa—or La Gioconda), people refused to believe that the lady with the strangely veiled gaze was merely a dull merchant's wife.

People began to psychologically analyze her inscrutable smile and the sublime magic of her appearance. Thus, the interpretation of the Mona Lisa oscillated between saint and harlot. Even the sparsely indicated landscape in the background struck a German art historian in 1909 as "dreamlike, as if it trembled in thundering sensuality."

The most discussed thesis to date is that the painting is a disguised self-portrait of Leonardo, who wanted to present his descendants with another riddle. A computer analysis between da Vinci's only authentic self-portrait, a drawing, and the Mona Lisa served as proof.

The former naturally has the crucial flaw that it shows the artist as a wrinkled old man over 60, while the Gioconda is at most 25 to 30 years old. This makes any facial comparison highly speculative.

Another (correct) argument is that there were no preliminary sketches or studies for this painting, although Leonardo usually made several pen drawings of his models. Of course not, because he only needed to look in the mirror to continue working on the painting.

Here too, things could have gone quite differently. It's possible that the preliminary studies were simply lost during one of Leonardo's numerous relocations.

A new theory from the self-portrait faction: the Mona Lisa wears a braided insert at the décolleté, which is called "vinco" in Italian—the parallels with da Vinci are obvious. But unfortunately, this vinco is worn by various ladies portrayed by Leonardo, such as Ginevra de Benci (around 1478) or Cecilia Gallerani (around 1485).

The most bizarre contribution to the Mona Lisa discussion was recently provided by archaeologists from the British University of Bradford. According to their analysis, the Gioconda's enigmatic mouth area can be traced back to a dental problem.

Leonardo merely wanted to hide his model's imperfect teeth behind a somewhat pinched smile. The real secret probably lies in an entirely new painting technique. Leonardo invented sfumato (Italian = hazy, misty).

This refers to a fluid, barely perceptible transition between areas of different colors. As a result, the shadows flow into each other, making the contours partially blurred, as well as the facial expression. A light veil of mist also hangs over the barely suggested smile and the shadows over the corners of the mouth of the dignified merchant's wife Lisa del Giocondo.

In December 1913, a gallery owner from Florence reported that an unknown person had offered to sell him the Mona Lisa.

Vincenzo Peruggia Arrested

The 32-year-old decorative painter Vincenzo Peruggia was finally arrested. He confessed to the theft but disguised it with the patriotic impulse of wanting to return one of its greatest artworks to Italy. The court didn't believe Peruggia's noble motives and sentenced him to seven months in prison.

After all, he had stored the painting, which was painted on thin poplar wood, so carefully that it suffered hardly any damage, to the amazement of experts. Since 2001, the Mona Lisa has smiled in a separate room of the Louvre behind triple bulletproof glass, secured by alarm systems.

The Louvre currently has no plans to sell the paint by numbers version of this masterpiece.

The Mona Lisa's Legacy

The Mona Lisa continues to captivate millions of visitors annually, making it not just a painting but a cultural phenomenon. Her mysterious smile has inspired countless artists, writers, and filmmakers. From Marcel Duchamp's satirical L.H.O.O.Q. to Dan Brown's "The Da Vinci Code," the painting remains central to popular culture.

Modern technology has revealed even more secrets about the painting. Infrared reflectography and X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy have uncovered Leonardo's painting techniques and confirmed that he continuously reworked the portrait, adding thin layers of paint to achieve the famous sfumato effect that gives the Mona Lisa her ethereal quality.

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