Was The Mona Lisa Based On Da Vinci’s Male Lover?

By Samuel Leighton-Dore

Here at Heaps Gay we occasionally enjoy trawling through the internet and uncovering theories of homosexuality repressed, disputed, or otherwise lost in the dusty pages of history.

We’ve written about the long-held (and vehemently disputed) notion that Jesus Christ might’ve been an openly gay man in a romantic relationship with his beloved disciple John – and we’ve explored the growing evidence to support Adolf Hitler being a crazed and repressed homosexual.

However, today we turn our gaze to the oft-neglected corners of queer art history, and in particular to the elusive and somewhat polarising smile of the Mona Lisa by Leonardo Da Vinci.

The true identity of the Mona Lisa has been the subject of scholarly speculation for more than 500 years.

Silvano Vinceti, the head of an Italian research group called the National Committee for Cultural Heritage, has recently come forward with claims that Leonardo Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa was in fact inspired by Da Vinci’s lifelong apprentice and rumored male lover, Gian Giacomo Caprotti – most commonly referred to by his nickname, Salai.

Using infrared lighting to build his impressive argument, Vinceti says that the Mona Lisa’s nose, forehead and smile are strikingly similar to other paintings by Leonardo which used Salai as a model, including portraits of St John the Baptist and St Anne and an erotic drawing, The Incarnate Angel, which depicts a young man with an erection.

“The Mona Lisa is androgynous – half man and half woman. The painting was based on two models. The first was Lisa Gherardini and the second was Salai, Leonardo’s apprentice,” Mr Vinceti told The Telegraph in April.

“You see it particularly in Mona Lisa’s nose, her forehead and her smile,” he said.

“We’ve come up with an answer to a question that has divided scholars for years – who was the Mona Lisa based on,” he said, speaking from Florence, where he has spent the past four years excavating beneath an old convent in the hope of finding the bones and skull of Lisa Gherardini.

Why not check it out and make your mind up for yourself?

The below sketch “Angelo Incarnato” from 1515 is believed to have been based on Salai (who was curiously also known as “the devil” or “the little unclean one”) and IMO offers a clear resemblance to the Mona Lisa.

Of course, there has already been strong resistance to Vinceti’s claims from the international arts history community.

“This is a mish-mash of known things, semi-known things and complete fantasy,” said Martin Kemp, professor emeritus of the history of art at Trinity College, Oxford.

“The infra-red images do nothing to support the idea that Leonardo somehow painted a blend of Lisa Gherardini and Salai.”

Regardless, the peculiar nature of Da Vinci’s relationship with the young and reportedly beautiful Salai is interesting in itself. Salai was gifted to Da Vinci at the age of 10-years-old and, despite there being no conclusive evidence of Da Vinci’s sexuality, there have been crude notebook sketches uncovered of Salia’s anus.

Hmmm.