Museum discovers earliest copy of 'Mona Lisa'

de bene esse: literally, of well-being, morally acceptable but subject to future validation or exception

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The earliest known copy of Leonardo da Vinci's "Mona Lisa" -- thought to have been painted at the same time as the original masterpiece -- has been discovered at the Prado Museum in Madrid, Spain.


The work offers art-lovers a tantalizing hint of what the model for the world's most famous painting really looked like.

Conservators found the portrait hidden beneath layers of black overpainting during restoration work on a picture initially thought to have been a later replica of the "Mona Lisa."

The restored version shows the same woman that Leonardo depicted, against a landscape similar to that shown in the background of the original, which now hangs in the Louvre in Paris.

And while the features of Leonardo's subject have been dulled by centuries of dirt and layers of cracked varnish -- which are unlikely ever to be removed -- in the recently-rediscovered copy, she appears fresher faced and younger than her better-known "twin."

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2095047/Mona-Lisa-copy-painted-Leonardo-da-Vincis-student-unveiled-Madrid.html