Mystery of the Mona Lisa smile solved

Scientists determine she is, in fact, smiling

Calling out to art critics and historians of the world! It’s time to finally answer the one question that has perplexed us all for centuries: whether the Mona Lisa is smiling or not. As it turns out, she really is.

Yes, you read that right. The renowned portrait, rendered by legendary Italian artist Leonard Da Vinci in 1503, is smiling, according to researchers from the University of Freiburg, who tested survey participant reactions to portraits.

As per The Independent, the team of researchers digitally manipulated black and white versions of Mona Lisa, creating four incrementally "happier" and gradually "sadder" versions of her image by adjusting the corner of her mouth.



A block of nine images were shown to 12 trial participants 30 times and then shuffled, with study participants asked to grade whether the Mona Lisa was happy or sad in each. Surprisingly, the original image was seen to be happy 97% of the time.

Juergen Kornmeier, co-author of the study, said, “Given the descriptions from art and art history, we thought that the original would be the most ambiguous.” However, the study showed that given the relative context of a field of faces, the original was perceived as happy. Juergen added, “Our brain manages to very, very quickly scan the field. We notice the total range, and then we adapt our estimates.”

Not such an ambiguous smile after all, it seems.

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