The Mona Lisa Vanishes: A Legendary Painter, a Shocking Heist, and the Birth of a Global Celebrity

The historical Leonardo da Vinci was born on April 15, 1452, in Vinci, Republic of Florence and died on May 2, 1519 in France. As Day shows, the circumstances of Leonardo’s birth interact with the historical values and events of the time, contributing to the man he became. Leonardo’s parents were of different social classes and never married. He was raised without his mother and among his legitimate siblings, among whom he was always the outsider. This condition, Day suggests, may have prevented Leonardo from embracing assumptions and illusions because he always knew that he would have to “make his own way through” the world (44).

Upon being apprenticed with a painter, Leonardo immediately distinguished himself with his extraordinary ability to create arresting images that seemed alive with light and movement. Day also describes him as “beautiful,” with “long golden locks, like Rapunzel’s, cascading down to the middle of his chest” (53). He was also “graceful and generous, effortlessly charming, an aid to any party” (53). He did not pursue power, money, and influence or collect many possessions, but he did collect friends and experiences.

At the time of Leonardo’s birth, Italy was not a unified country but a series of rival city states and kingdoms. Leonardo traveled among them as his curiosity moved him. He left Florence for Milan to pursue his scientific interests, returned to Florence after Milan became politically unstable, spent time in Rome, and finally traveled to France with his admirer, the French king Francis I. Day repeatedly returns to the improbable nature of Leonardo’s encounter with Lisa Gherardini, both because of his travels, apparent lack of commitment to completing his paintings, and Gherardini’s circumstances. Their improbable encounter, engineered by events beyond their control, became an enduring mystery and object of fascination.

Lisa Gherardini was born in Florence into an old, aristocratic family that had become less influential over time. Day describes political circumstances impacting her father’s ability to save a dowry for her, which compromised her marriage prospects and increased the likelihood that she would spend her life in a convent. Lisa did end up in a convent, but only after marriage and children. When Lisa was 15, her father arranged her marriage to a widowed 30-year-old merchant and trader, Francesco del Giocondo. The name of her portrait Mona Lisa means “my lady Lisa” in Italian, and it is how Francesco described her in his last will and testament.

In the opening chapter, Day describes Lisa as “intriguing, unknown, beautiful” (1), noting that women lived sequestered lives in Florence, being forbidden from owning property or businesses and required to have a male guardian. Given these restrictions, Day notes the irony of her face becoming known around the world as a source of endless fascination that generated stories and interpretations, many of which may have little to nothing to do with the facts of her life. The creation and existence of her portrait remains a testament to life’s enduring mysteries and improbable possibilities.

Born in August 1846, Louis Lépine was chief of police at the time of the Mona Lisa’s disappearance. By that point, he was at the end of a storied political career that included expert management of a student uprising in Paris 1893 and the modernization of the French police. Lépine also effectively navigated civil unrest in Paris in the wake of the Dreyfus Affair and captured and destroyed the anarchic Bonnot Gang. His tenure as police chief ended in March 1913, and he died in November 1933.

The answer to the question of “who would lead the Mona Lisa investigation” (30) was always Lépine. Nevertheless, Day shows that with all his skills and successes, Lépine had his limitations, and they very much stemmed from his assumptions. Lépine’s assumptions about who would steal the painting and why prevented him from bringing his formidable skills to bear on the investigation. Day recounts how the police questioned everyone who worked on the glass box installation team, but never considered the unassuming immigrant, Perugia, a suspect.

Alphonse Bertillon was born in April 1853 and died in February 1914 in Paris. His father was the statistician Louis-Adolphe Bertillon, and Alphonse followed in his footsteps. Bertillon is known for applying anthropometry, a technique of anthropology, to policing, creating his self-named Bertillon system, which used an extensive series of measurements to identify criminals. His system was eventually abandoned in favor of fingerprinting, as noted in The Mona Lisa Vanishes.

Day remarks that Bertillon went through life with the wrong name. He was meant to be called “Albert,” but when his father registered his birth, he forgot the name that he and his wife had chosen. Day’s inclusion of the story provides an example for the motif of improbability that Day explores in the book. Having the wrong name does not change Bertillon, but it is evidence of endless random happenings that can become ultimately insignificant, as with Bertillon’s name, or world-changing, as in the example of Leonardo and Lisa’s meeting.

Bertillon’s early career was not successful, but his interest in developing anthropometric methods led him to develop forensic techniques that shaped early policing. As in the case of Lépine, Bertillon’s confidence in his abilities proved a hindrance at times. Despite not being an expert in handwriting analysis, he twice testified that an incriminating letter was written by Alfred Dreyfus’s hand. Dreyfus’s conviction is a tragic testimony to the dangers of pseudoscience and the pernicious presence of antisemitism in Europe before the world wars. The investigation of the Mona Lisa’s theft ultimately ended with the recovery of the painting, but independently of Bertillon’s efforts.

Vincenzo Perugia was born in Italy in 1881 and emigrated to Paris in 1908. Early in his time in Paris, Perugia worked in the Louvre and became acquainted with the artworks and the manner in which they were displayed. In 1911, Perugia stole the Mona Lisa and hid it in his apartment. Police twice visited him there to question him but never searched the place.

Perugia himself was responsible, somewhat inadvertently, for the return of the Mona Lisa to the Louvre. Two years after he stole it, Perugia brought it to Florence and contacted an art dealer, who consulted with the director of the Ufizzi. Day notes that Perugia did not resist their attempts to take possession of the portrait and was surprised by his imprisonment and trial, which took place in Italy, not in France: “I have rendered outstanding service to Italy, and instead of being thankful, they throw me in jail. It’s the height of ingratitude” (220).

Perugia’s defense was that he was a patriotic Italian who wished to give “the country back a treasure of inestimable worth” (220). He claimed that walking through the gallery in which Italian masterpieces were displayed inspired him to want to rescue the art and bring it home. As Day notes, while it is true that Napoleon plundered Italian artworks, the Mona Lisa was brought to France by the artist himself. Perugia’s earlier attempts to sell the painting for profit cast further doubt on his defense, but it moved his Italian audience who “showered [him] with gifts” of “wine, cheese, cigarettes” and money (220). Perugia was ultimately released and went on to serve in the Italian army in World War I.