c.1503-1506: Leonardo paints the portrait of Lisa, commissioned by her husband Francesco del Gicondo, at his studio in Florence, Italy.
1503: Agostino Vespucci witnesses Leonardo painting the portrait of Lisa del Giocondo, and suggests it will be intentionally left unfinished. He details this account in the now famous ‘Heidelberg Document’.
1504: Copying Leonardo’s portrait of Mona Lisa, Raphael makes a pen and ink sketch of a ‘Young Lady on a Balcony’, who is flanked by two columns.
1506: Leonardo departs for Milan quite suddenly at the request of Charles d’Amboise, leave the ‘Earlier Mona Lisa‘ unfinished, and likely takes it with him when he leaves Florence.
1513: Under the patronage of Giuliano de Medici in Rome, Leonardo is working on the Louvre ‘Mona Lisa‘, possibly using the ‘Earlier Mona Lisa‘ portrait of Lisa del Giocondo as a model.
1517: Antonio de Beatis accompanies the Cardinal off Aragon on a visit with Leonardo in Cloux, near Amboise, France, and is shown a finished portrait of:”… a certain Florentine lady … “, and records that the was commissioned by Giuliano de Medici. It is widely accepted that the portrait that he saw is the version of the Mona Lisa that is now hanging in the Louvre.
1518: A Royal receipt details the transaction, facilitated by Leonardo’s apprentice Salai, in which the Louvre ‘Mona Lisa‘ enters the French Royal Collection.
1525: Upon his death, an inventory of Salai’s possessions in Milan lists a high-valued painting as ‘La Honda‘, which is believed to be a short form for ‘La Gioconda‘, and is corrected as such in a later version of that inventory.
1550: Giorgio Vasari describes the portrait of Lisa del Giocondo as having been left unfinished in his compendium of biographies: The Lives of the Most Excellent Italian Painters, Sculptors and Architects (also known as the Vite).
1568: Vasari publishes a second, revised edition of his Vite nearly 20 years later, in which he again describes the painting as unfinished.
c. 1570-1770: During the turbulent times in Italy and France, no records of the painting’s whereabouts are uncovered.
1584: Gian Paolo Lomazzo notes two separate but similar paintings by Leonardo ‘La Gioconda‘ and a ‘Mona Lisa‘ in his Treatise on Pictures, Sculptures and Architecture’.
c.1778: The painting is believed to have been acquired in Italy by English nobleman James Thomas Benedictus Marwood, while making his ‘Grand Tour’, and brought to England as part of an art collection to be housed in his Somerset manor.
1858: An auction at Avishays House in Somerset, England, features ‘La Joconde‘ by Leonardo da Vinci. The same painting had been on exhibit at the Yeovil Fine Arts Exhibition two years prior.
1913: Hugh Blaker, art connoisseur and curator of the Holburne Museum in Bath, England, rediscovers the painting at the Somerset manor house of an aristocratic family. Blaker acquires the painting and brings it to his studio in Isleworth, London, where it becomes known as the ‘Isleworth Mona Lisa‘.
1914: The painting is sent to the United States for safekeeping during World War I. It is housed in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts until 1918.
1915: John R. Eyre, art historian and expert, writes a monograph on the painting, which is immediately published in London and New York.
1922-1926: Eyre follows up with a book on the painting, detailing ten reasons for recognising it as the earlier version of Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci. In this book, he documents that the painting was brought to Rome in 1922 and was examined by Leonardo experts. Most of them confirmed its attribution to Da Vinci.
1936: Hugh Blaker dies. His sister Jane and Murray Urquart, his colleague and the executor of his estate, arrange the display of Blaker’s ‘Isleworth Mona Lisa‘ in an exhibition of his private collection of paintings at the Leicester Galleries in London.
1951: Encyclopaedia Americana lists the ‘Isleworth Mona Lisa‘ as the earlier of two original versions by Leonardo da Vinci.
1962: Old Master paintings specialist and collector, Dr. Henry Pulitzer, acquires the painting, the subject of his 1966 book, Where is the Mona Lisa?
1975: Pulitzer has the ‘Isleworth Mona Lisa‘ brought to Switzerland, where it is locked away in a bank vault.
1979: Henry Pulitzer dies, and the painting is bequeathed to his partner, Elizabeth Meyer.
1982: Internationally acclaimed French almanac, L’Encyclopédie Quid, acknowledges the existence of two versions of the Mona Lisa by Leonardo: The earlier version in a Swiss bank vault, and the later version in the Louvre, Paris. It continues to publish this same listing in subsequent years.
2008: Elizabeth Meyer dies, and the painting passes to an international consortium. The Mona Lisa Foundation is established as an institution, mandated to conduct all necessary research to determine if the ‘Earlier Mona Lisa‘ was painted by Leonardo. The initial research team consists of those that had been working on the painting since 2004.
2012: The Mona Lisa Foundation publishes the findings of 35 years of research and tests in its book Mona Lisa – Leonardo’s Earlier Version and releases these findings to the press and the public.
2014: The ‘Earlier Mona Lisa‘ begins a worldwide exhibition tour. The premiere opens at the Old Parliament with the support if the Singapore government agencies and the endorsem*nt of the Singapore Arts Council.
2015: Professors Lorusso and Natali publish, in a peer-reviewed journal, a comprehensive review of Mona Lisa versions and copies and determine that the ‘Earlier Mona Lisa‘ and the Louvre ‘Mona Lisa‘ are original paintings by Da Vinci.
2016: The exhibition opens in Shanghai to large public and critical acclaim. Professors Asmus, Parfenov and Elford publish a peer-reviewed paper confirming to 99% certainty that Leonardo painted both the ‘Earlier Mona Lisa‘ and the Louvre ‘Mona Lisa.
2017: The Louvre Museum publishes a new book in which the author, Vincent Delieuvin states that Raphael and other copyists must have based their copies of the Mona Lisa on a version other than that in the Louvre today.
