MONA LISA COPIES

    "Mona Lisa", "La Gioconda", "Leonardo da Vinci" - these are words now familiar to every man in the street all over the world. The only artwork known to everyone. Female image haunting a contemporary everywhere.
     How many copies of this painting have been written and are there any author's copies available? How many Gioconda renderings have been created? One will hardly dare answer this question.
     There exist more than a dozen well-known copies which date back to the 16-th century, there are copies by well-known artists of 17-19-th centuries, there is a large iconography of naked Gioconda, there are many works on Mona Lisa theme painted by avant-garde classics of the 20-th century.
      Ageless "Mona Lisa" brand has been spreading globally for years.
     Where there is demand, there is supply. It's amazing, but auctions continue selling not only numerous Mona Lisa twins by unknown artists of the past years but also Gioconda remakes painted by modern artists.
Many of these paintings are of no significant artistic value, but the history of some works dated back to the 16-th century is so great that they are worth a separate story.  
Vernon Mona Lisa

     One of such copies with interesting history is the "Vernon Mona Lisa" called by art critics by the surname of the painting owners - Vernon family from the USA. The painting which had been kept in a bank storage vault for a long time was exhibited just twice for a short period of time, but even that was enough for da Vinci experts being involved into discussions as to the authorship of this painting. One could hardly call it an exact copy of the Louvre's "La Gioconda". The "Vernon Mona Lisa" has another form of the head, she's got no enigmatic smile, the background scene of the painting is not so detailed. But, as owners of the work state, this very painting is the original by Leonardo da Vinci. And they have good grounds to assert this.
       
     In 1778 a young aristocrat William Henry Vernon, a heir of a wealthy French-English family which had moved to America in the middle of the 18-th century, graduated from Princeton University and was sent by his parents to Paris to acquire high-society gloss. Vernon was favoured by a great family friend John Adams, who was then holding a post of the United States Ambassador in France and later on became the second president of the USA. In Paris Vernon was introduced to King Louis XVI and Queen Marie Antoinette with best recommendations. Soon Vernon fell in love with witty light-headed Marie Antoinette and became her favourite. The handsome young man visited not only all luxurious festivities in Versailles and meetings of famous "intimate circle" of the Queen, but also, according to some evidences, the royal bedroom.
     Close relations of Marie Antoinette and Vernon are proven by the fact that after Marie Antoinette had got to know about her favourite's collecting Renaissance paintings, the queen with careless generosity presented him many masterpieces being ornaments to the Louvre at that time.
     Vernon returned to America in 1797 and brought a collection of 52 paintings which included artworks by Rembrandt, Raffaello, Rubens, van Dyck and other famous masters. The "Second Mona Lisa" was also in the collection, it was catalogued as "The Nun" by Leonardo da Vinci. Dairy of Vernon's wife contains records stating that every evening William Henry used to pray in the family bedroom in front of this luxuriously framed painting.
     It's hard to say to which image did Vernon pray recalling Marie Antoinette: whether it was true "Mona Lisa" or yet unknown "The Nun". However, genuine documents concerning the Louvre's treasury inventory testify that the register for the year of 1700 contained painting by Leonardo da Vinci "The second Mona Lisa La Gioconda with the value no less than that of the first one", but the painting was not mentioned in the register for the year of 1806. During the period between two inventories it mysteriously disappeared from the Louvre together with other paintings by famous masters.

     According to the words of present owners of the "Vernon Mona Lisa", they plan selling the painting in the future. This is due to the fact that now the painting belongs to eight relatives, in the next generation there will be seventeen of them, and in future the number of owners will increase even more, and it will be more difficult to make any decisions as to the painting's future. Moreover, in the owners' opinion, now the time has come for the artwork to be displayed in one of the best museums in the world so that everyone willing to see it could do so.


     Below you can find Mona Lisa's "family album". Its pages display her close "relatives" ("La Gioconda" copies) as well as distant family members (Gioconda renderings).
     Due to large number of claimants to the place in the "family album", their range had to be limited to the most impressive individuals.

Leonardo da Vinci
Mona Lisa, Louvre. 1517    

Mona Lisa, Prado
Unknown artist
Mona Lisa, Prado 1517

Gabriel Joseph Ferrier Mona Lisa Maria
Gabriel Joseph Ferrier
Mona Lisa Maria

Mona Lisa, Reynolds
Unknown artist
Mona Lisa, Reynolds

Mona Lisa (copy).
Unknown artist
Mona Lisa (copy)

Tor Egil Hansen Mona Lisa (copy)
Tor Egil Hansen
Mona Lisa (copy). 2005

Andrea Salai Mona Vanna
Andrea Salai
Mona Vanna. 16 с.

Joos van Cleve Monna Vanna
Joos van Cleve
Monna Vanna

May Trung Thu Mona Lisa.
May Trung Thu
Mona Lisa. 

Raeda Saadeh Mona Lisa.
Raeda Saadeh
Mona Lisa. 2008

Kazimir Malevich Composition with Mona Lisa.
Kazimir Malevich
Composition with Mona Lisa. 1914

Igor Kuznetsov Mona Lisa (manumission copy)
Igor Kuznetsov
Mona Lisa (manumission copy) 2009

Holger Bar Untitled (Mona Lisa)
Holger Bar
Untitled (Mona Lisa). 1999

Andy Warhol Two White Mona Lisa
Andy Warhol
Two White Mona Lisa.1980

Fernando Botero Mona Lisa, Age Twelve
Fernando Botero
Mona Lisa, Age Twelve. 1959

Jean-Marie Aude Mona Bored.
Jean-Marie Aude
Mona Bored. 1997

Blek le Ret Mona Lisa
Blek le Ret
Mona Lisa

Jose Maria Mona Frida
Jose Maria
Mona Frida. 2003

Mona Lisa Abastract
Unknown artist
Mona Lisa Abastract

Unknown autor Mona Lisa Percolator
Unknown autor
Mona Lisa Percolator

Jacob Brest Mona Lisa
Jacob Brest
Mona Lisa

Hand Woven Coir Mona Lisa
Unknown autor
Hand Woven Coir Mona Lisa. India

Gianni de Conno Mona Lisa Photo
Gianni de Conno
Mona Lisa Photo


Andrea Salai Mona Lisa (copy), Thalwil.
Andrea Salai
Mona Lisa (copy), Thalwil. 16 с.

Philippe de Champaigne Mona Lisa (copy), Oslo.
Philippe de Champaigne
Mona Lisa (copy), Oslo. 1525

Mona Lisa, Walters.
Unknown artist
Mona Lisa, Walters.1640

Mona Lisa copy
Unknown artist
Mona Lisa (copy)

Mona Lisa (copy)
Unknown artist
Mona Lisa (copy)

Jean Ducayer Portrait of Woman.
Jean Ducayer
Portrait of Woman.17 c. 

Andrea Salai Donna Nuda, Hermitage.
Andrea Salai
Donna Nuda, Hermitage. 16 с.

Jioconda Nude Mackenzie
Unknown artist
Jioconda Nuda MacKenzie

Salvador Dali Self-portrait as Mona Lisa
Salvador Dali
Self-portrait as Mona Lisa

Banksy Mona Lisa Mujaheddin
Banksy
Mona Lisa Mujaheddin. 1975

Jasper Johns Figure 7.
Jasper Johns
Figure 7. 1968

John Stango Mona Lisa
John Stango
Mona Lisa

Roman Cieslewicz Mona Tse-Tung.
Roman Cieslewicz
Mona Tse-Tung. 1977

Valery Koshlyakov Mona Lisa
Valery Koshlyakov
Mona Lisa. 2008

Vik Muniz La Joconde
Vik Muniz
La Joconde

Victorvictori Multiplism Mona Lisa
Victorvictori
Multiplism Mona Lisa

Fernando Bateroi Mona Lisa
Fernando Bateroi
Mona Lisa

Brian Moss Mona Lisa Psychedelic
Brian Moss
Mona Lisa Psychedelic

Olga Kitt 21 Century Mona Lisa
Olga Kitt
21 Century Mona Lisa. 2009

Mona Lisa Portugal
Unknown artist
Mona Lisa Portugal

Gael Davinche Suddenly She Felt a Terrible
Gael Davinche
Suddenly She Felt a Terrible. 2011

Cristen Cumings Mona Lisa from jelly beans
Cristen Cumings
Mona Lisa from jelly beans


Unknown artist Mona Lisa (copy), Hermitage.
Unknown artist
Mona Lisa (copy), Hermitage. 16c 

Bernardino Luini Mona Lisa (copy), Rome
Bernardino Luini
Mona Lisa (copy), Rome 

Isleworht Mona Lisa.
Unknown artist
Isleworht Mona Lisa. 1505

Louis Beroyd Mona Lisa (copy),
Louis Beroyd
Mona Lisa (copy), 19 c.

Unknown artist La Belle Gabrielle
Unknown artist
La Belle Gabrielle

Carlo Antonio Procaccini Jioconda Flora
Carlo Antonio Procaccini
Jioconda Flora

Jioconda Nuda, engraving
Unknown artist
Jioconda Nuda, engraving

Marcel Duchamp Mona Lisa.
Marcel Duchamp
Mona Lisa. 1919

Naoto Katori Mona Lisa Geisha.
Naoto Katori
Mona Lisa Geisha.

Jean-Michel Basquiat Mona Lisa.
Jean-Michel Basquiat
Mona Lisa. 1983

Naoto Katori Sweet Dreams
Naoto Katori
Sweet Dreams

Banksy Mona Lisa.
Banksy
Mona Lisa. 1975

Robert Raushenberg Pneumonia Lisa
Robert Raushenberg
Pneumonia Lisa. 1982

Rene Magritte La Gioconda
Rene Magritte
La Gioconda. 1960

Fernand Leger Mona Lisa With Keys.
Fernand Leger
Mona Lisa With Keys.1930

Roman Cieslewicz Les Mona's Lisa's.
Roman Cieslewicz
Les Mona's Lisa's. 1969

Victorvictori Multiplism Mona Lisa
Victorvictori
Multiplism Mona Lisa. 1984

Matias Argudin Mona Lisa.
Matias Argudin
Mona Lisa. 2006

Mona Lisa Computer
Unknown artist
Mona Lisa Computer

Mona Lisa Postmodern
Unknown artist
Mona Lisa Postmodern

Silk carpet Mona Lisa
Unknown autor
Silk carpet Mona Lisa. China

The Woven Mona Lisa
Unknown autor
The Woven Mona Lisa


     Replenishment of Mona Lisa's "family album" by relevant references is welcome in comments to this post.

Materials on the subject: