10 Paintings: Leonardo da Vinci Quiz

Answer: The title is the feminine form of her married name, meaning da Vinci made a pun while naming it.

The French name for this painting is "La Joconde", which is simply the French translation from the Italian title. There is widespread consensus that Lisa Gherardini was the subject, though there is a wide list of candidates, the most prominent being Isabella of Aragon and Caterina Sforza. However, most art historians follow the accounts of Renaissance historian, Giorgio Vasari, whose biography of Leonardo da Vinci has been the main source of information about the ultimate Renaissance man. Including a pun in the title was apparently something that would have fit the genius of da Vinci quite well.

The chocolate company slyly alluded to in the answer options, by the way, is the Ghirardelli Chocolate Company, which wasn't founded until 1852.

Answer: 2012: An elderly parishioner painted over Jesus' face, which looked a bit like a monkey.

Indeed, the 2012 catastrophe of art restoration took place on an otherwise unremarkable fresco painting titled "Ecce Homo" in a church in Borja, Spain. The restoration remains in place and has even brought the church increased visitors curious about this world-famous botch-job.

"The Last Supper" has suffered quite a number of its own catastrophes. Whether it was French Revolutionary troops, art restoration experts that don't really know what they are doing, or global wars, the painting has seen better days. Even a curtain, hung in 1768 to protect the painting, ended up damaging it instead. It trapped moisture onto the painting's surface and scraped off paint chips when it was pulled back. It makes you wonder who made these kinds of decisions.

A final restoration project was completed in 1999, with a wide variety of techniques utilizing technology. Some art historians have criticized this final effort as having changed the original too much.

Answer: ermine

"The Lady with an Ermine" (1489-1490) features the mistress of Ludovico Sforza, who commissioned many of da Vinci's works. She was kind to Leonardo and invited him to various meetings with Milanese intellectuals. They would discuss politics, philosophy, and other issues of the day.

She was only sixteen when the painting was started, and it shows her holding an ermine, a pet often kept by the aristocracy of that time. Tellingly, her dress is simple and not indicative of the nobility. She was later married off to a lowly count when the duke's wife found out he was still seeing her.

Answer: Salvator Mundi

"Salvator Mundi" (c. 1500) means "Savior of the World" in English. Though some art historians believe that da Vinci didn't paint it, it still became the most expensive painting ever sold when it was sold at a public auction to Badr bin Abdullah Al Saud, who was the Minister of Culture for Saudi Arabia.

The painting was said to have been purchased for the Louvre Abu Dhabi. The painting was placed in a gilded frame in the 19th century and remained in that frame until 2005, when it was removed and the painting restored.

Answer: sfumato

The technique of sfumato was popular among artists of the High Renaissance, and it is one of four techniques identified by art historians as vital to Renaissance art including chiaroscuro, cangiante, and unione. Leonardo da Vinci also used this technique in the "Mona Lisa".

The idea is to replicate a kind of smoky, softening effect that the human eye naturally applies to the outlines of the world. The result is a more realistic image.

Answer: juniper

In Italian, "ginepro" is the word for juniper, and this pun was not lost on Leonardo. Since the plant also commonly represented chastity, the temptation to include wordplay in his painting was apparently too good to resist.

The painting was believed to have included the lower part of her body down to her hands, but this section was lost to history. Its acquisition by the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. in 1967, gained this painting the distinction as the only Leonardo da Vinci work in the Americas.

Answer: Napoleon Bonaparte

Napoleon was one of the world's greatest art thieves as he ransacked the museums of Italy, declaring to his people, "We will have everything that is beautiful in Italy." The painting hung in the Louvre until it was returned in 1815, and the artist was once again listed as Leonardo da Vinci.

The subject of the painting was long believed to have been Ludovico Sforza, who was the duke of Milan, but a restoration revealed the subject holding a sheet of music, eliminating the duke as the probable subject. Some art historians have offered up various musicians and nobles as the possible subjects over the years.

Answer: Andrea del Verrocchio

Andrea del Verrocchio's studio was immensely influential to the creation and development of Renaissance art. "The Baptism of Christ" was painted by both del Verrocchio and da Vinci, with the latter becoming more of a topic of historical interest than his master. The painting sits in the Uffizi in Florence, where a great deal of Renaissance art finds its home.

Answer: True

Marcus Vitruvius Pollio, also known as Vitruvius, wrote a treatise on architecture and ancient philosophy titled "De architechtura". This text is now well over 2,000 years old. A description of the proportions of the human body in the Ancient Roman work inspired da Vinci to draw the man out on paper.

Historians will note that da Vinci actually changed the proportions that Vitruvius had written out after measuring the proportions of several men and coming to his own conclusions. Nonetheless, the "Vitruvian Man" is a prime example of Renaissance artists and philosophers looking back to Ancient Greece and Rome for inspiration.

Answer: St. John the Baptist

"Saint John the Baptist" (c. 1513-1516) depicts the famous Christian figure in isolation. Previous depictions of the saint had shown him to be gaunt, which showed that da Vinci had departed from this tradition. Many art historians believe this may have been because Leonardo's subject for the painting was his pupil, Salai.