You've probably seen this, but I just learned the story behind it. The one on the right was most likely painted by Da Vinci's student. It has been in a private gallery for years, because everyone thought it was a replica made after Leonardo's death. It was coated with a thick black paint and varnish, but recently they realized that it had a LOT more underneath the black background, and after they restored it they realized it wasn't a bad copy of Da Vinci, it was a whole other painting! It was likely painted at the SAME time Da Vinci painted the Mona Lisa, but it's a LOT bigger than Da Vinci's! They also think that (partially based on this one) Leonardo's painting has actually worn down quite a bit over the years, you can see in the student's work that she had thin eyebrows that she probably plucked herself haha. Reminds me of those latina women who draw theirs on... They've been able to learn a lot about Da Vinci through the discovery of this work!
I wonder if the student wanted to make his rendition dark because he was ashamed of his work compared to his master's? Or if he did this to make it more his own? Or after Leonardo died? Or if someone else did it??? Pretty cool that something as amazing as this was treasured and preserved - I can't imagine how many works of beautiful art no one ever got to see. (The angels probably keep copies, it's too sad to think of otherwise. Lol)
Love you :)
I am CERTAIN the angels keep copies of everything! How coll that they can tell this was a student painting done at the same time! The things they can figure out astonish me. And I'm curious about the dark coating, I also wonder who would have done that. I don't think the student had anything to be ashamed of, I like this version! The colors look gorgeous in this. I didn't know how badly Leonardo's work had faded.
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