Art is a broad range of human activities that involve the creation of auditory, visual, or performed

artwork (artefacts) that reflect the technical or imaginative skills of the author and are meant to be

acknowledged for their emotional power or beauty. The oldest documented art types are the visual arts,

encompassing objects such as films, photography, printmaking, sculpture, and painting.

My favourite work of art is the Mona Lisa (link: https://www.leonardodavinci.net/the-

mona-lisa.jsp), Leonardo da Vinci's half-length portrait painting. This artwork, regarded as an

Italian Renaissance archetypal masterpiece, is the most visited and well-known (Liaci et al.,

2017). What makes Mona Lisa my favourite work of art is how perfectly and beautifully the

painting was done, from the forehead to the eyes, nose, lips, and every other element of the

work! Leonardo perfected the art of invisible transitions between colours, light and shade, and

sometimes between colours alone. He blended each part without borders, making it subtle and

invisible to the naked eye.

The luminescence of Mona Lisa's skin and hair were painted with layers of transparent

colour, each just a few molecules thick, thus making the face of Mona Lisa appear glowing; this

gives the painting a magical and ethereal quality.

 (Clark, 1973).

The realism of Leonardo’s painting of Mona Lisa is attributed to the diverse scientific

observations that enabled him to create a mathematical system to determine the size in space and

the torso, including the eyes and head, which were inclined a little bit toward him, the viewer. He

used aerial perspective to create the illusion of depth, resulting in a flawless painting.

References
Clark, K. (1973). Mona Lisa. The Burlington Magazine, 115(840), 144-151.

Liaci, E., Fischer, A., Heinrichs, M., van Elst, L. T., & Kornmeier, J. (2017). Mona Lisa is always happy–

and only sometimes sad. Scientific reports, 7(1), 1-10.