Bonne Fête!
Monday, July 14, 2008 at 9:00AM 
Happy Bastille Day everyone! To commemorate the date I've posted one of my favorite Paris images: the room in the Louvre that holds La Joconde on a summer afternoon. Yes, in high tourist season you can't even get close.
I took this the last time I was in Paris a few years ago and thought the scene was utterly hilarious. It always makes me wonder, why take a picture of a painting behind bullet-proof glass when you can go to the gift shop and buy a postcard reproduction?
At any rate, the Mona Lisa is such an ubiquitous symbol of France that I thought it appropriate for the day.
I'm not a huge fan of the painting, but she does have an intriguing history, which most people overlook. Leonardo da Vinci completed the portrait of Lisa del Giocondo while living in France toward the end of his life. François I invited him to France and da Vinci was only too happy to accept since it is believe he was being run out of Italy due to rumours of his homosexuality. François I purchased the painting and kept it at Fontainebleau, until it was given to Louis XIV. Louis XIV moved it to Versailles, where it remained until after the Revolution, when it was moved to the Louvre for a short time. Napoleon I quickly appropriated it for his bedroom in the Tuileries Palace, but it was eventually returned to the Louvre once again. Apart from being hidden during many conflicts and wars, and one notable case of theft during the early 20th Century, La Joconde has remained at the Louvre for all these years. Now that she has such a nice, climate-controlled chamber, I sincerely doubt she'll ever leave.
Vive la France!
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