What the Mona Lisa has in common with Britney Spears

Not that I know from personal experience---I was going to write "not that I know about if first hand" but you'll see why I changed my mind about that.---but a lot of the Celebrity nudes on the internet are bogus.  They're the work the work of fanboys and fangirls with overheated imaginations and access to Photoshop who cut and paste the heads of the stars of stage, screen, television, rock and roll etc on the naked bodies of models and porn stars.

But there's an older and, I think, classier tradition of artists, or people with at least some skill with a brush or a pencil, drawing or painting nudes of celebrities.  This tradition probably extends back to the day when artists worked primarily with hammers and chisels.  I'm sure that somewhere in among all the hieroglyphs someone sneaked in idealized nudes of Cleopatra and Nefertiti.  Helen of Troy must have made regular naked guest appearances on the urns.  And while as Caesar's wife, Calpurnia, was above suspicion, that almost certainly didn't stop the pornographic tile artists and wall painters from working her into their mosaics and murals.

So it's not surprising that there are nudes of the most famous woman in the history of art, Lisa Gheradini---La Giaconda, the Mona Lisa---floating around.  What's amusing is the the idea that some of them might have been done by Da Vinci himself:

Nude, Mona Lisa-like painting surfaces

Leonardo da Vinci, in a Renaissance version of Mad Magazine, may have painted his famous Mona Lisa in a number of ways, including nude. Now, a painting has surfaced that looks much like the original, sparking debate over just how far the master took his iconic painting.

The newly revealed painting, hidden for almost a century within the wood wall of a private library, shows a portrait of a half-naked woman with clear links to the famous (and clothed) Mona Lisa.

Of course, another possibility is that Da Vinci wasn't working from his imagination here.

The Mad Magazine reference in the story's lede is dated.  I'm thinking that what we have here is an example of early 16th Century sxting.

Back then young women who wanted give their boyfriends, lovers, and husbands a thrill didn't have to worry that it would come back to haunt them when they started their professional careers.  Scolds and prudes, though, probably warned them about it ruining their marriage prospects and I'm sure the Ross Douthats of the day wrote the Renaissance equivalent of op-ed pieces lamenting the loss of modesty among the maidens of Florence and how much more nicely the girls behaved back in his grandmother's day.

I just hope Lisa Gheradini wasn't a schoolteacher or a sports reporter.

Comments

[Formerly Apostate]

I don't understand the big deal about nudity. We all look more or less alike, and most people have a reasonable idea what anyone they can see with clothes on will look like without them. In today's age, with such widespread porn, who cares if they can put a name to some nude guy or girl?

Truly don't understand the fuss.

I agree that nobody should be exposed without their consent, but if we just relaxed about nudity as a culture, nobody would be so eager to expose anyone without consent.

[Kathleen Maher]

Everybody has a naked body...somewhere, usually hanging around nearby.