For my Contemporary Project, I printed out a picture of Leonardo da Vinci’s painting ‘Mona Lisa’. However, the printer had ran out of toner and the image’s colours were completely altered. The painting’s original and naturalistic colours were replaced by bright fuchsia, coral, violet and royal blue. There was no longer proof of the technique da Vinci used-(‘sfumato’) in this painting, since the smooth transitions of tones were replaced with harsh lines. I decided that I would use that print for this task and proceed to strip the image from what made it so monumental within the art world. Other than the ‘sfumato’ technique, Mona Lisa’s gaze and smile played a role in making it such a popular painting. Mona Lisa’s eyes were painted in a specific way, making them follow you when you move around, which gave the painting mystery. Mystery was also created by her ‘smile’. When looking away from her mouth, it falls under the viewer’s peripheral vision, making it unclear. This, along with a little shading at the cheek bones make her mouth look like a smile. But once the viewer focuses on her mouth, the smile slowly disappears.

I decided to cover her face, and therefore cover her mysterious gaze and smile. I painted over her face using a palette knife, which added texture to the painting, and the vibrancy of the colours transformed the image even further. Having now removed everything that made the original image so impressive, I started to take it in as a work of art on its own. Even though the mystery of the gaze and smile was removed, the image now consisted of anonymity, since her face was covered. The texture and colours that were added stripped the image of its original meaning and gave it a whole new meaning, therefore eroding the conventional definition of what artwork can be.