Could it be? Mona Lisa in the nude?

Well, experts have found enough clues to suggest that a charcoal drawing, housed in the collection of Renaissance art at the Conde Museum at the Palace of Chantilly, may have been a preparation sketch for the Mona Lisa.

After tests were conducted at the Louvre Museum in Paris, curators believe the sketch is “at least in part” by Leonardo, reports BBC. Clues pertaining to the relation of the two portraits include:

• The hands and body are almost identical
• The portraits are almost the same size
• Small holes pierced around the figure suggest it may have been used to trace its form on to a canvas

If you look hard enough, there sure is some resemblance:

Housed in the collection since 1862, it is believed to have been a commission from cloth merchant and Florentine official Francesco del Giocondo for a portrait of his wife, Lisa Gherardini.

Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa oil painting (also known as La Gioconda) remains one of the world’s most recognisable and valuable works of art.

Speaking about the sketch, curator Mathieu Deldicque said:

The drawing has a quality in the way the face and hands are rendered that is truly remarkable.

It is not a pale copy. We are looking at something which was worked on in parallel with the Mona Lisa at the end of Leonardo’s life.

It is almost certainly a preparatory work for an oil painting.

However, tests are still being carried out to determine the exact nature of the painting.

One concern from Louvre conservation expert Bruno Mottin is that the “hatching on the top of the drawing near the head had been done by a right-handed person while Leonardo drew with his left hand”:

“We must remain prudent,” he told AFP, as work continued.

“It is job that is going to take some time,” he said. “It is a very difficult drawing to work on because it is particularly fragile.”

All that for a painting.

[source:bbc]