Message #260712

[Java Blue]

WHO WAS THE MONA LISA?

Florentine noblewoman, Lisa Gherardini,  is widely believed to be the model for Leonardo da Vinci's painting.

Lisa Gherardini is thought to have posed for the painting between 1503 and 1506.

Not much is knownown about Gherardini's life. Born in Florence and married in her teens to a cloth and silk merchant who later became a local official, she was mother to five children.

It is believed Francesco Del Giocondo commissioned the portrait to celebrate either his wife's pregnancy or the purchase of a house around 1502 and 1503.

After his death, Gherardini became a nun. She died in 1542 at the age of 63 and was said to be buried near the Sant'Orsola convent's altar.

In 2014 scientists conducted a DNA test on bones fond at the convent which they believe belonged to Gherardini but the results are still to be released.

Unlike the original painting, which hangs in the Louvre museum in Paris, art lovers will also be able to take home their own digital living Mona Lisa for themselves.

The team behind the project, which consisted of 40 technicians and artists, plan to produce digital Mona Lisas in a variety of sizes and formats, including miniature versions that can be placed on pendants.

Florent Aziosmanoff, who came up with the original concept, told the Telegraph: 'Now she can sense changes in her surroundings.

'Leonardo da Vinci tried to make her come alive, so it's appropriate that we've taken his intentions a few steps further.

'This is primarily an artistic project, not a commercial one, but we want to make paintings cheap enough for tourists to buy and take home as a souvenir.'

The team also plan to release a smartphone app that will allow people to carry around a living version of the Mona Lisa with them in their pockets.

To create their digital version of the painting, the team first used specialised computer software to capture a three dimensional wire frame image of the portrait.