{"id":895,"date":"2012-02-08T18:15:33","date_gmt":"2012-02-08T18:15:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/libnews.binghamton.edu\/news\/specialcollections\/?p=895"},"modified":"2012-02-08T18:15:33","modified_gmt":"2012-02-08T18:15:33","slug":"the-prado-museum-unveils-a-copy-of-the-mona-lisa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/libnews.binghamton.edu\/specialcollections\/2012\/02\/08\/the-prado-museum-unveils-a-copy-of-the-mona-lisa\/","title":{"rendered":"The Prado Museum Unveils a copy of the Mona Lisa"},"content":{"rendered":"<h1 id=\"article-title\">Spain Unveils &#8216;Mona Lisa&#8217; Copy Done\u00a0 by da Vinci Apprentice<\/h1>\n<div>\n<p>Published February 02, 2012<img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/a57.foxnews.com\/img.foxnews.com\/static\/managed\/img\/fn-latino\/lifestyle\/660\/371\/Spain Mona Lisa.jpg\" alt=\"Spain Mona Lisa.jpg\" \/><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<div>\n<div>\n<div>\n<ul>\n<li>\n<div>\n<p>A copy of Leonardo da Vinci&#8217;s Mona Lisa that was painted at the same time as\u00a0 the original in the same studio is displayed at the Prado Museum in Madrid\u00a0 Wednesday Feb. 1, 2012. Spain&#8217;s Prado Museum says the copy it has of Leonardo da\u00a0 Vinci&#8217;s Mona Lisa was painted at the same time as the original perhaps making it\u00a0 the earliest replica of the masterpiece. A museum spokeswoman said the work was\u00a0 painted side by side with the 16th century original that hangs in the Louvre in\u00a0 Paris and was done by one of Leonard&#8217;s key students. (AP Photo\/Paul White) (AP2012)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<div>\n<p>Officials at Spain&#8217;s Prado Museum unveiled a copy of Leonardo da Vinci&#8217;s\u00a0 famed &#8220;Mona Lisa&#8221; painting that was almost certainly painted hand-in-hand with\u00a0 the Italian polymath by one of his apprentices.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p>The stunning find of what the Prado now says is probably the earliest known\u00a0 copy of La Gioconda will give art lovers and experts an idea of what the Mona\u00a0 Lisa looked like back in the 16th century, said Gabriele Finaldi, the museum&#8217;s\u00a0 deputy director collections.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It is as if we were in the same studio, standing at the next easel,&#8221; he told\u00a0 reporters.<\/p>\n<p>The copy has been part of the Prado collection for years and displayed\u00a0 occasionally but no one paid much attention to it because around the woman in\u00a0 the Mona Lisa was a stark black background, not the pretty landscape seen in the\u00a0 original.<\/p>\n<p>Two years ago, to get the copy ready for a da Vinci exhibit later this year\u00a0 in Paris, where the original hangs in the Louvre, tests were done and this gave\u00a0 restorers a hint that something lie under the black coat, which was added in the\u00a0 18th century for reasons not fully understood.<\/p>\n<p>When the black covering was removed, a Tuscan landscape very similar to the\u00a0 one in the original emerged.<\/p>\n<p>And X-ray tests which allow experts to peek under a painting&#8217;s surface to see\u00a0 how it developed as it was composed showed that changes made in the copy were\u00a0 similar to changes made to the original as it evolved.<\/p>\n<p>Varnish has also been removed from the Mona Lisa&#8217;s face, making it look\u00a0 brighter and younger than the face coated with cracked, darkish varnish at the\u00a0 Paris museum.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;You can imagine that this is what the Mona Lisa looked like back in the 16th\u00a0 century,&#8221; Finaldi said.<\/p>\n<p>Miguel Falomir, the Prado&#8217;s director for Italian painting, said the copy\u00a0 gives art lovers and experts a chance &#8220;to admire the Mona Lisa with totally\u00a0 different eyes.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>He and Finaldi said the museum&#8217;s best guess is that the copy was done by a da\u00a0 Vinci apprentice named Francesco Melzi, because of the style observed in it.<\/p>\n<p>Besides the black background, one other difference from the original is the\u00a0 woman in the copy has eyebrows and the Mona Lisa in the real masterpiece does\u00a0 not.<\/p>\n<p>There are dozens of the surviving replicas of the masterpiece from the 16th\u00a0 and 17th centuries.<\/p>\n<p>The Louvre supports the Prado&#8217;s new evaluation of the painting, Finaldi\u00a0 said.<\/p>\n<p>The Prado plans to put it on display later this month before it travels to <a href=\"http:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/topics\/france.htm#r_src=ramp\">France<\/a> for the da\u00a0 Vinci show.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>Read more: <a href=\"http:\/\/latino.foxnews.com\/latino\/lifestyle\/2012\/02\/02\/spain-unveils-mona-lisa-copy-done-by-da-vinci-apprentice\/#ixzz1loc3DTch\">http:\/\/latino.foxnews.com\/latino\/lifestyle\/2012\/02\/02\/spain-unveils-mona-lisa-copy-done-by-da-vinci-apprentice\/#ixzz1loc3DTch<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Spain Unveils &#8216;Mona Lisa&#8217; Copy Done\u00a0 by da Vinci Apprentice Published February 02, 2012 A copy of Leonardo da Vinci&#8217;s Mona Lisa that was painted at the same time as\u00a0 the original in the same studio is displayed at the Prado Museum in Madrid\u00a0 Wednesday Feb. 1, 2012. Spain&#8217;s Prado Museum says the copy it [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-895","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-archives-in-the-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/libnews.binghamton.edu\/specialcollections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/895","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/libnews.binghamton.edu\/specialcollections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/libnews.binghamton.edu\/specialcollections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/libnews.binghamton.edu\/specialcollections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/libnews.binghamton.edu\/specialcollections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=895"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/libnews.binghamton.edu\/specialcollections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/895\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/libnews.binghamton.edu\/specialcollections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=895"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/libnews.binghamton.edu\/specialcollections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=895"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/libnews.binghamton.edu\/specialcollections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=895"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}