Thursday, February 10, 2011

Why its so famous

Our centuries-old fascination with da Vinci’s La Gioconda (shown here restored to her original colors) is said to be due to her faint smile — at once human, mysterious, attractive, and unattainable. Leonardo said of the technique he used to paint the famous portrait, sfumato, that it was “without lines or borders, in the manner of smoke or beyond the focus plane,” an accurate description of the many-facetted nature of smiling.
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6 comments:

  1. at once human, mysterious, attractive, and unattainable. Leonardo said of the technique he used to paint the famous portrait, sfumato, that it was “without lines or borders, in the manner of smoke or beyond the focus plane,” an accurate description of the many-faceted nature of smiling.

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  2. e world’s best-known smile is intriguing precisely because it could indicate a range of moods; Bob Dylan described Mona Lisa as having the “highway blues.” (Harvard neurobiologist Margaret Livingstone argued, in an article in Science from 2000, that La Gioconda’s smile exists in your peripheral visual field, but vanishes when you look directly at her mouth, see sidebar.)

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  3. I don't get it.. she is creepy =|

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  4. i too don't get it:) above comments are taken from the an article.
    one point that is made that the smile appears sad if you directly see it.but if you focus on some other feature on the side of picture the smile widens.

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  5. @ puzzled
    beauty lies in the eyes of the person observing. if u dnt like mona lisa means u dnt have sense of art n paintings. and if u dnt like paintings its no big deal if u dnt find it attractive or impressive. but there is no doubt in the fact that mona lisa is a work of a genius. the painting that will amaze humans for centuries. plus if u are not into this kinda art then u wont like it too. i mean all of us have out own likes n dislikes. suppose u are a surreal painter or abstract artist, u may not like mona lisa even then so it all depends on ur personal like n dislike. but if u have to argue about its greatness i dnt think i need to argue about it coz its already a proven fact. to argue about mona lisa's greatness is similar to arguing why are pyramids or stone henge so special. i think u get my point.

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  6. @ sidrah
    hard to believe a girl doesnt like paintings :) girls are mostly into art n painting stuff. but its all a matter of personal choice that u like something or not. but still it will remain a work of genius.

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