LEONARDO DA VINCI : “Picture of a lady (Gioconda, Monna Lisa)” - 1503-05 - oil on table, 77- 53 cm. - Paris, Louvre.

Nothing or almost nothing can be said about this portrait that has not been repeated over and over again. It's the most celebrated painting of the western art, and, probably, the most famous work of art of the world. It has inspired books and films, it has been the protagonist of the most famous robbery of the history of the art, has been studied with all type of methods, artistic or scientific, to discover possible hidden drawings, cracks, to determine which percentage of the painting corresponds to the face (4,9%), to the landscape (20,3%) or other elements. Thousands of copies, retorts, interpretations and caricatures have been created, including the mustached Gioconda by Dalí or the attacked Gioconda by Duchamp, and, recently, a team of Scientifics have tried, basing on the analysis of the painting, to reproduce the voice of the portrayed lady.

In a purely artistic plane, the Gioconda is an extraordinary work, in which the Leonardesque sfumetto reaches its high expression. There are no brushstrokes, only layers that give the painting an almost unreal aspect, as is observed in its extremely famous smile and in the landscape of the foreground. There are still debates about the identity of the portrayed lady, although traditionally it's believed to be the wife of Francesco del Giocondo. This indecision has allowed numerous” visionaries to propose new and “authentic giocondas, in spite of the multitude of evidences that indicate that the work in the Louvre as the one and only.