Of course it's not just you. Plenty of people have felt very disappointed after seeing La Joconde.
I didn't, however. It is an incredible painting. Don't worry so much about the face. Look at the hands. Look at how alive they look. Da Vinci was able to make the skin feel plump and real. It shows subsurface scattering, the shadows are realistic and coherent. You can effortlessly imagine the texture of the fabric on her arms, how it sits slightly compressed on her right arm because of the angle, while more open and stretched out on her left arm. The light reflections are astonishing, and again, completely believable.
I'm an absolute nincompoop when it comes to art, but spending 5 minutes in front of this made me wish I had studied it more carefully.
the crowd is absolutely nuts there, couldn't even make it close. In many other places, the online time slots nowadays seem to work pretty well to spread out the crowd, but with the Louvre it seems that all of those 8 million annual visitors all go directly into that room, ignoring the other, like, 20 acres of that museum....
I didn't, however. It is an incredible painting. Don't worry so much about the face. Look at the hands. Look at how alive they look. Da Vinci was able to make the skin feel plump and real. It shows subsurface scattering, the shadows are realistic and coherent. You can effortlessly imagine the texture of the fabric on her arms, how it sits slightly compressed on her right arm because of the angle, while more open and stretched out on her left arm. The light reflections are astonishing, and again, completely believable.
I'm an absolute nincompoop when it comes to art, but spending 5 minutes in front of this made me wish I had studied it more carefully.