Alternate ‘Mona Lisa’ unveiled

A private Swiss art foundation claimes that Leonardo ds Vinci painted an earlier version of his masterpiece Mona Lisa. The foundation that is solely dedicated to the alternate painting unveiled this earlier version on Thursday. But an expert on da Vinci in Britain says there is evidence that the Renaissance master may not have been behind the picture presented as the "Earlier Mona Lisa" but known more commonly as the "Isleworth Mona Lisa." The Mona Lisa Foundation, based in Zurich, offers a wealth of documentation to support its argument that the painting it represents is a predecessor -- from the master's own hand -- to the world's most famous portrait hanging in the Louvre Museum in Paris.

Martin Kemp, Professor Emeritus at Oxford University, who has examined the arguments, says the "reliable primary evidence provides no basis for thinking that there was 'an earlier' portrait of Lisa del Giocondo." In addition to a 320-page art book titled "Mona Lisa -- Leonardo's Earlier Version," the foundation's website makes its case using visual widgets of painstaking side-by-side comparisons of the "Isleworth" with the Mona Lisa, magnifying their similarities down to the small details. The obvious resemblance, easily visible to the untrained eye, could be evidence that the work is just another copy of the portrait of Lisa del Giacondo that was painted after the Mona Lisa was completed -- and likely by someone else, Kemp said in a press release.