Mona Lisa's Smile Broke a Few Standards of Patriarchy

Art is never finished, only abandoned is a famous saying of Leonardo da Vinci. His life and work bear witness to this fact. His great Mona Lisa took 16 years to become what we see as Mona Lisa today. He was never satisfied, he kept drawing over it time and again. Finally he in fact died without completing it; or it may be more right to say, many times completed it but without finishing or perfecting it.

Apparently the renaissance masterpiece Mona Lisa was commissioned by a businessman to paint the picture of his wife. Perhaps the businessman was never satisfied by what was painted. Whether Mona Lisa was a real woman is still a mystery by itself.

Mona Lisa

When most secular women in paintings had a stiff appearance, Mona Lisa has a relaxed appearance. Mona Lisa has a triangle composition to bring the gaze of the audience directly to her face. And I guess Da Vinci had reason for it. He wanted us to see her face and its features. Most women up to then in secular paintings never looked at the audience, Mona Lisa looks straight at the audience. Even if some women in paintings looked at the audience they never smiled; Mona Lisa smiles at the audience; and she does it with confidence. I think that is the most important fact about the celebrated mysterious smile of Mona Lisa. Da Vinci's paintings were often coded. If we decode Mona Lisa we would find that Leonardo da Vinci broke a few patterns of the patriarchy here. Mona Lisa was never completed; may be it was the businessman who had commissioned it who was never satisfied by the image on canvas. Perhaps Da Vinci's was one of the early resistance for gender equality in history staged by Leonardo da Vinci.

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