Why I Hate the Mona Lisa (and Possibly the Louvre)
The Mona Lisa may be the worst painting in the Louvre. It is certainly the most overrated. Viewing it is undoubtedly the worst artistic experience in that vast, overcrowded museum. The collection holds 35,000 other works, and almost any of them is bound to provide more intellectual and aesthetic pleasure than the maddening effort of trying to get close to Western Civilization’s most famous painting. Viewers feel compelled to take their own photos of the painting to prove they were there. Napoleon loved the Mona Lisa. One can imagine that it was not so difficult to get a glimpse of Lisa Gherardini (the wife of a Florentine merchant) during the Napoleonic era. On my second trip to Paris in 1978, which might as well have been the Napoleonic era, I beheld the painting for the first time. I have seen it a few times since, and the crowds have grown increasingly impenetrable. Ten million people flock to the painting each year, each wanting to check the box. The Louvre recently announced ...
