How a Crime Made The Mona Lisa Famous
By: Sean Kernan
Tags: Humor, Art, Life, Life Lessons, Marketing

How a Crime Made The Mona Lisa Famous

It benefited from an unintentional marketing campaign.

Photo by Juan Di Nella on Unsplash

The Mona Lisa sucks. Yeah, I said it, sucks.

Go walk through Le Louvre. The museum is filled with thousands of priceless paintings. Humanity will never see comparable achievements again.

So many pieces appear touched by the hand of God.

It was my first time in Europe. The long line that surrounded the building was well worth the wait.

I marveled at Napoleon’s apartment, his ceilings covered in art.

My pupils dilated when I got to the Raft of Medusa.

This painting is huge, by the way. Artist: Théodore Géricault Wikimedia Commons

Then, you’ll eventually arrive in an overcrowded room. There will be a mob of people pushing towards this painting like it’s the last raft off the Titanic.

Their cell phones will be held in the air. They’ll be whispering in wonderment.

It couldn’t be more underwhelming.

In fact, if you are standing there and you do a 180-degree turn:

The Wedding at Cana greets you. Which I’d argue is much more technically impressive.

Now, I acknowledge that art is subjective. But more than a few of you will be sorely disappointed if you expect the Mona Lisa to blow your mind.

In fact, if you were to ask Da Vinci himself, “What was your best painting?” I’d wager he wouldn’t choose the Mona Lisa.

In fact, the Mona Lisa was a relatively unknown painting until 1911. On the morning of August 21 of that year, three men snuck out of the museum carrying the Mona Lisa in a bag.

It was 28 hours later when someone noticed it missing on the wall. Up until that point, it was not much of a standout. It was in a hallway, sandwiched between rows of other paintings.

The missing Mona Lisa. Source: histomania

The story quickly broke that the Mona Lisa had been stolen. It spread across France, and then international outlets began covering the story.

The New York Times picked up on it as well, as a worldwide manhunt ensued.

The thieves had been three Italian men. The main thief, Vincenzo Peruggia, was a handyman for Le Louvre. He’d waited in a closet until the museum had closed. Then, after hours, he’d snuck out to snatch the painting.

He was unable to sell the painting right away because of how widespread the news coverage was.

Source: Pic by Vintage News

In fact, his theft proved to be the ultimate marketing campaign. The mystery surrounding the painting’s disappearance led to countless conspiracy theories and hypotheses on who had it.

There were countless wormhole storylines that kept springing up too. French poet Guillaume Apollinaire, who is the father of surrealism, was arrested as a suspect, due to previous statements saying that Le Louvre should be burned down.

Later, Picasso was arrested, under the accusation of having stolen the painting. But was later cleared. (Think about how much publicity these news articles would’ve generated.)

The Mona Lisa was ultimately recovered 28 months later, when the handyman, Peruggia, got tired of holding it and tried to sell it to a local art dealer, who turned him in to the police.

Peruggia went on to serve eight months in prison. He’d claimed that he stole it because he felt it belonged back in Italy. Investigators claimed he wanted to make money off a replica business, which would have increased in value after the theft.

Today, the Mona Lisa sits secured in a way that no other painting in that museum is, guarded by bulletproof glass.

Da Vinci would have never imagined that one of his paintings would be the subject of a worldwide manhunt. The publicity was earth-shaking. Every major newspaper in the world had pictures of the Mona Lisa in it. Billions suddenly wondered who had his painting. And is there ever a greater feeling of importance? That your art is the subject of one of the greatest crimes of the 20th century?

No artist review, commercial, or branding campaign could ever match what that handyman’s theft did for the Mona Lisa.

Nothing drives awareness like a good old fashioned museum heist.

So now you have a fun party fact to rattle off: the Mona Lisa is only mega-famous because it was stolen and newspapers talked about it for two years straight.