According to a report in The Telegraph , there is a proposal to relocate the Mona Lisa to an underground chamber at the Louvre due to busy photographing and interest in the painting.
Louvre director Laurence des Cars has suggested moving the renowned artwork to a dedicated room constructed in the institution’s basement. Des Cars expressed concerns about the current viewing conditions, stating, “We don’t welcome visitors very well in this room, so we feel we’re not doing our job properly. Moving the Mona Lisa to a separate room could put an end to public disappointment.”
Vincent Delieuvin, the Louvre’s chief curator of 16th-century Italian painting, indicated that the idea has been under consideration for some time and has gained widespread support. He remarked, “It’s a large room, and the Mona Lisa is at the back, behind its security glass, so at first glance, it looks like a postage stamp.”
The Louvre receives approximately nine million visitors annually, with the Mona Lisa serving as the main attraction for 80 percent of them. The painting’s immense popularity often results in large crowds, with up to 250,000 people queuing on busy days.
Efforts to enhance the viewing experience have included repainting the gallery’s walls from eggshell yellow to midnight blue in 2019, as well as implementing changes to the visitor queuing system. However, Delieuvin stressed the need for additional measures due to the influence of social media and mass tourism, particularly following the artwork’s heightened celebrity status following its theft in 1911.
“In this day and age, you have to have seen something that everyone is talking about at least once in your life, and the Mona Lisa is clearly one of those ‘must sees’,” Delieuvin emphasized.
