I have been lured to the louvre since i was a student of fine arts. I finally made it there on my last trip to Paris. The magnificience of the museum is beyond description both on the outside and the inside. Besides the fact that it hosts the original Monalisa - where all the tourists are mostly seen crowded. It has a colossal collection of art pieces from the pre classical, classical, neoclassical & rennaissance periods and an excellent collection of Egyptian and Mesopotamian arts. It is almost too difficult to come out of the maze of the museum. I remained unsatisfied even after sitting infront of some of the pieces for a long period of time - the one thing i enjoyed the most was taking the Da Vinci trail.
There are very few people i know who have not read Dan Brown's The Da Vinci code...this is one of my favourite fiction books. Of course a lot of fiction from the book stands to be clarified but a lot of subtelities in Da Vinci's and works of other artists of that period had been controvertial,mysterious and hence interesting. This was due to the political climate plus other social issues regarding race, religion and gender which lay in the forefront during those times in Europe.
Art being a major medium of communication - the artists did take a liberty or two which remained often hidden and was left to the interpretation of the beholder. It is what we call a "scotoma" or a blind spot created in an image which is invisible untill you decipher it.This is so typical of the Mannerism style of painting. Infact amongst many others, Carravaggios 'Death of the virgin' was also rejected by the commissioning convent based on the scotoma vigilance. And ofcourse there are innumerable interpretations to why Da Vinci in 'Wedding feast at Cana' shows Virgin Mary sitting next to Christ and holding an imaginary glass of wine ? Well, considering the colossal size and abundant detailing of that painting i would think Da Vinci forgot to draw the glass.
According to me the most overrated painting in the entire Louvre is 'Monalisa' - it is perhaps due to its over exposure that one fails to see the true beauty or maybe i fail to appreciate Da Vinci's 'sfumato' technique which has left the world contemplating weather Monalisa is smiling or not. She seemed downright grumpy to me especially with all that crowd around her.
