The Three Mona Lisas

249 Pages·2014·122.499 MB·English

by  Rab Hatfield

RAB HATFIELD
THE THREE
MONA LISAS
WITH 82 ILLUSTRATIONS IN COLOR
o
OFFICINA
LlBRARIA
To Gary M Radke
Front Cover:
Leonardo da Vinci, Mona Lisa (La Gioconda).
Paris, Musee du Louvre.
Editorial coordination
Marco Jellinek
Art direction and cover design
Paola Gallerani
Layout
Serena Solla
Color separation
Euroforolit, Cernusco sui Naviglio (Milan)
Printed by
Monotipia Cremonese, Cremona
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,
srored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any
means, electronic, mechanical, phorocopying, recording or otherwise,
withour the prior written permission of the publisher.
isbn: 978-88-97737-39-1
© Officina Libraria, Milan, 2014
\\ ,\w .offici nalibraria.com
Primed in leah-
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PREFACE
INTRODUCTION v
PART ONE
SETTING THE STAGE
1. VASARI AND SOME OTHER WELL KNOWN 3
SOURCES AND DOCUMENTS
Lisa, Antonmaria, and Francesco 4
Three curious things about Vasari's report 9
On what does Vasari base his information? 14
Further questions and points about Vasari 17
Francesco again 19
Things about the Mona Lisa that do not seem to agree with what Vasari says 21
Some preliminary conclusions 22
The early history of the Mona Lisa 24
The inventory of Salal's estate 24
The visit of the Cardinal of Aragon and Don Antonio de Beatis 27
The early history of the Mona Lisa (continued) 29
The Magnificent Giuliano de' Medici 31
Vasari in Milan 32
Vasari's description 33
The musician(s) or singer(s) and jesters and "Mona Lisa's" smile 35
The title La Gioconda 37
In France 38
Vasari and La Gioconda 41
"La Gioconda" and names 42
II. THE MONA LISA AS WE SEE IT NOW 45
Innovative features 46
Body and face 48
Head shawl and veil 49
Dress and other body apparel 52
Hands and chair 56
The setting 57
The columns 58
The loggia or covered terrace and the lighting 59
The perspective, "Mona Lisa", and the viewer 60
The landscape 62
Unexpected features 65
The seeming contradictions in our two main sources 67
and three attempts to resolve them
PART TWO
THE THREE MONA LISAS
III. THE CHANGES 75
The x-ray photographs and the first Mona Lisa 75
The craquelure 79
The infrared reflectographs and the second Mona Lisa 80
Underdrawing and reworking in Leonardo's Virgin, Child, and St. Anne 82
Technical differences between the Virgin, Child, and St. Anne 85
and the Mona Lisa
Further evidence that the second Mona Lisa was a different 86
version of the portrait
Changes in the face and figure 88
Changes in the clothing 90
Possible clues to the appearance of the second Mona Lisa 93
in some early portraits by Raphael
Some conclusions about the infrared reflectographs 94
Changes in the landscape 95
The emissiograph and the second Mona Lisa 97
Other special photographs 100
The second Mona Lisa: a summary 102
IV. THE ANNOTATION OF SER AGOSTINO VESPUCCI 105
An (abandoned) portrait by Leonardo of "Lisa del Giocondo" 108
existed as of October of 15 03
The abandoned portrait was the first Mona Lisa 109
Ser Agostino and Leonardo 110
Why Leonardo abandoned the first Mona Lisa 112
The first Mona Lisa and Vasari 113
Leonardo, "another Apelles the Painter" 114
Leonardo's incapacity to finish 116
Ser Agostino and "Lisa del Giocondo" 116
The date of the second Mona Lisa 117
The date of the third Mona Lisa 120
Francesco del Giocondo and Giuliano de' Medici 122
The third Mona Lisa and Raphael 123
Why Leonardo reworked the portrait 124
Some conclusions 126
V. FILIPPO STROZZI'S LETTER 129
Reasons for believing Mon{n}a Lisa to be 132
the subject of Leonardo's portrait
Francesco del Giocondo's probable ownership of 134
the second version of the portrait
How Giuliano de' Medici might have acquired Mon{n}a Lisa's portrait 135
For whom did Giuliano want the portrait? 137
Francesco del Giocondo and his "woman" 138
Francesco del Giocondo, Lorenzo de' Medici, and Filippo Strozzi 139
Filippo Strozzi and Mon{n}a Lisa 140
Lorenzo de' Medici and Mon{n}a Lisa 142
Giuliano de' Medici, Mon{n}a Lisa, and Francesco Giocondi 142
Giuliano de' Medici and Baldassare Castiglione 145
Giuliano's love poems 147
Giuliano's {supposedly} dissolute behavior 149
Lisa and Giuliano 151
The portrait of Mon{n)a Lisa that Leonardo evidently 153
repainted for Giuliano de' Medici
Leonardo on portraiture 155
The date of the third Mona Lisa 157
Why Leonardo painted Mon(n}a Lisa 158
and why Francesco del Giocondo commissioned him to paint her
La Gioconda 160
Final remarks 164
PLATES 167
BIBLIOGRAPHY 223
INDEX 227
PHOTO CREDITS 237
PREFACE
T
his book had its origins in the semi-annual undergraduate seminars on Leonardo
da Vinci that 1 taught at Syracuse Unversity in Florence until a couple of years
ago. Because of a fortunate discovery, I was for several years greatly interested in
Leonardo's lost Battle ofA nghiari in the Great Hall of what is now Palazzo Vecchio in
Florence and therefore made the acquaintance of Ingegnere (now Professor) Maurizio Se
racini. He had been searching for the lost battle mural for decades and had produced
some extraordinary reconstructions of the walls of the Great Hall, on one of which Leo
nardo began it. And so 1 arranged for a number of my Leonardo classes to visit his studio,
known as Editech, so he could tell the students (and me) about his efforts to recover the
mural and show us some of his fascinating material. As Seracini had also produced some
extraordinary infrared reflectographs revealing the underdrawing of Leonardo's Adoration
oft he Magi, I asked him to show some of these to the students also.
During one of his more recent presentations, Professor Seracini showed us some other
material as well in order to demonstrate to the students how much can be learned about
works of art by means of special investigative techniques such as infrared reflectography
and x-ray photography. For example, he showed us some reflectographs of Leonardo's
Annunciation in the Uffizi, by means of which we could see the corrections the artist
made in the face of the angel in that painting. He also showed us a delightful x-ray pho
tograph of Raphael's Lady with a Unicorn, in which anyone can see that the "unicorn" was
once a very sloppily painted dog, which obviously was nor by Raphael.
Then he showed us an infrared reflectograph of the Mona Lisa (figs. 6 or 73). I shall
never forget the gasp of amazement that went up from the first group of students who saw
this reflectograph, let alone the astonishment that I experienced myself. There before our
disbelieving eyes was incontrovertible proof that the world's most famous painting once
looked different. I can still remember the students pointing out several of the numerous
changes that Leonardo evidently made in this earlier version or state of the painting in
order to arrive at the one we know today. The reflectograph was followed by some x-ray
photos. In one of these (fig. 22) one can see two pairs of eyes, which at the time we all
supposed to belong to the present painting and an earlier version respectively. (I no longer
believe this.) In another we could see that the mouth in an earlier version of the painting
apparently was completely effaced. And it was clear to everyone that the face seen in the
x-ray photos was not the same face we see today.
About a month after the visit to Editech, the Leonardo seminar made one of its semi
annual visits to the Louvre. There we chanced across the Museum's newly released Au cceur
de La Joconde (Inside the Mona Lisa) in its fine bookstore. (I need to confess that it was