Mona Lisa Is Identified...and She Speaks!

Enough posts about Philippe or taxes! (Or maybe we should write about Philippe's 2006 taxes.)

No, let's get back to serious art history:

We can now rest assured that the sitter for Leonardo's mysterious lady really is who we thought she was. Sylvia Westall of Reuters reports:

Lisa Gherardini, the wife of a wealthy Florentine merchant, Francesco del Giocondo, has long been seen as the most likely model for the sixteenth-century painting....Now experts at the Heidelberg University library say dated notes scribbled in the margins of a book by its owner in October 1503 confirm once and for all that Lisa del Giocondo was indeed the model for one of the most famous portraits in the world.

...or maybe not.

But wait, stop the presses! (What presses?) Reuters previously reported that "Japanese researchers say they've reconstructed the voice of the Mona Lisa." What's more, you can hear it now (and even see her lips move!). They will be booking her soon on Conan O'Brien. Its amazing what pseudo-scientists and journalists can come up with when they pool their prodigious talents on slow news days (like today). And don't get me started on hack novelists.

(If you play this Talking Mona Lisa video, you'll have to have the patience to endure the long Talking Advertisement that precedes it.)

Translation (for those of you who don't read Japanese): My name is Mona Lisa. My real identity is wrapped in mystery. Some people say I am Mary Magdalene, others Lady Gioconda, or Isabella D'Este, Da Vinci's mother or even some say I am Da Vinci himself. However the only thing I can say is that I am the most loved woman in the world and the woman with the most mysterious smile.