Mona Lisa Daydream : Musée du Louvre

Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci

Mona Lisa Daydream : A Problem of Mona Lisa (and I)

The single-painting exhibition, St. Jerome of Leonardo da Vinci at the Metropolitan Museum of Art made me thought of the presentation of Mona Lisa by the same artist at the Musée du Louvre in Paris, which I visited just a few weeks ago on September 11, 2019. Maybe I can write about Mona Lisa before posting about recent exhibitions in NYC.

St. Jerome by Leonardo da Vinci

I visited the Louvre Museum in the morning on September 11, and stayed there until evening. After I went through most of the artworks I at least wanted to see at this visit, I went to look for the Mona Lisa which was moved from it's original location to a separate viewing space.

Mona Lisa has moved to a new location so these signs were taking over the museum.  (I liked those signs.)

The wait line for viewing Mona Lisa on a weekday was about 30 minutes to an hour for a weekday, which was not too bad from what I expected. However there was one thing it seemed that I eliminated from my last and first time seeing Mona Lisa came back to my me when I had her back in front of me.

It is that seeing Mona Lisa is only possible for us under very specific condition. The painting is presented under a strict control and time management by the serious security guards that gives us feeling of rushing, and that is the only condition we can see the most visited lady.
The distance we have from the painting makes it almost impossible to see any details of the painting, while standing right in front of the painting, unless we bring our own binoculars, which I don't have anyway.

In the end, today, a finely printed reproduction that is available everywhere will do much better job for us to observe the painting. Is it the most contemporary way to see art these days? This made me wondered what it means going to see something real. What is the value of seeing something in person, seeing something the original not the reproduction. What is the value of seeing original work. What Mona Lisa at Louvre could contribute to us when we visit to see the original painting.

It might be a question that matters only for painters who want to steal something, who want to learn something, who want to see skills and thoughts of artist through the painting. It maybe not a matter for most of people and that is why no one is discussing about it, or maybe just I don't know. Only kind of discussions I hear about around the Mona Lisa viewing situation in Louvre Museum is that the artist himself or Mona Lisa did not imagine or did not predict that this particular single painting would be worshiped and become the most visited painting in the world.

To me Mona Lisa is the best example in the world for people today eliminating the value and benefit of seeing the original artwork in person. It is funny because Mona Lisa is still Mona Lisa, and it is still a wonderful painting.

After waiting on the line and take picture of or with the Mona Lisa, I myself has just experienced that I do not actually remember if I directly looked at the paining which I always do in any exhibition I go.
....Maybe we can call it Mona Lisa magic or Mona Lisa daydream.

The Sekaido ST Card from art supply store in Japan. I just wanted to thow this image..:)

Even the picture of Mona Lisa I took (to send to my parents) does not bring back much memory about the painting compared to the photos of other works I took in the museum.

What I surprise me and makes me feel crazy is that this, about this viewing situation of Mona Lisa, is exactly the same as when I visited Louvre for the first time about a decade ago. Yes 10 years ago, and it seems like it will be probably the same as long as the painting's presence.