The Controversy Surrounding the "Male Mona Lisa"

Are you aware of the controversy surrounding the male Mona Lisa? Do you know the story about this? The male Elisa? No. No. It's, there's the most expensive painting ever sold. It was sold for 400 million dollars to the Bin Salaam, what is his name? Mohammed Bin Salaam. Am I saying his name right? The head of Saudi Arabia? MBS. MBS. This is his actual name though, I'm sorry. I think you were close. I fucked it up. It's probably Brian Saunders. Mohammed Bin Salaam. No, close. Salomon. Salomon. Salomon. Salomon. Salomon. Okay, the MBS, the head of Saudi Arabia bought it for 450 million dollars. This is it. And the crazy thing is someone bought it at one point in time in the past, I want to say for 1500 dollars and they didn't realize that it may or may not be, because this is where it gets controversial, may or may not be the work of Leonardo da Vinci. So it was restored. So do the history of this, the controversy and the history of it. Yeah, there's a crazy history to it where someone bought it for extremely low amount and then a Russian oligarch bought it for over 100 million dollars. See $1,175 at an attic sale in New Orleans for a dirty painting that he hadn't even seen. After a painstaking restoration, I think took a decade, some began whispering that it might be by the master himself. So an art dealer in 2005 paid $1,175 for it. So 16 years ago someone paid $1,175 for the most expensive painting ever sold. So then this guy, go down, scroll down. I can't get this article as well. Oh, it's one of them. Oh, that's one of them. There's a bunch of other articles that are free that you could read about it, but it's a crazy story. So this person, I believe started working on it in 2005, started the restoration. And then by the time, I think it was around 2015, they started realizing like, holy shit, because I guess sometimes in the past someone would take a great painting and they would paint over it. Yes, I've heard of this. Which is crazy. And so then there's this insanely painstaking restoration project where you're removing layer upon layer upon layer. What? $60 this was sold for in 1958. $60, so it gets even crazier. This was an article from 2017 where it was on auction for even less than it just sold for. Yeah, so it was on auction for $100 million then. And that's when it was bought by the Russian oligarch before MBS bought it. So is the controversy that the person who originally bought it should get a kickback because they didn't know the value? No, here's the controversy. The controversy is it may not be by Leonardo da Vinci at all. I see. And or it might be partly by da Vinci. And so Google this. There's a scan of the image and I don't understand the technology involved in the scan, but the scan apparently revealed that there's more than one era of painting or there's more than one application of painting, meaning that more than one person worked on it at more than one time. Like an exquisite corpse. A hidden drawing. I was thinking original Mona Lisa, so this might not. No, no, this doesn't reveal it. This is not it. It's about there was a digital scan of that painting. What is it called again? It said male Mona Lisa. There's another name for it. There's a name for that painting. I forget what it is, but Salvatore Monday Monday. Yeah. So when they did the scan, there's something about the hands and the way the paint is done on that in relation to the rest of it, that it's like, you know, they're talking about like fucking microns. They're measuring death and layers and age and all sorts of different shit. And they're trying, but it's what you're dealing with $450 million for a fucking painting. So it gets down to this dispute. It's a long page about it. Okay. See if you can see the images because there's images of the analysis. Have you scrolled down? It's a beautiful painting. Yeah, it is very beautiful. Oh, there we go. There's images. Is that what it used to look like on the right? I think that's what it used to look like. And then they slowly but surely restored it to the point where it's at now. Is that what it looked like? There's versions of it. People would, yeah, there's more than one version of it. So people would buy paintings like, you know, a hundred years ago, 500 years ago, and just fucking start scribbling on it. Paint over it. Yeah. So they had to go over these things to restore them. Like insanely painstaking. Like I said, it took like 10 years to restore this. I see. I see. They're doing like these, this is a what do you call a cross section analysis. Yeah. Wild shit. Yeah. Because they have to find like what is the original paint color? So they have to find the original layer. Exactly. So that's what it used to look like. Imagine that. And then they bring it from that to what you see now. Like look at that. Oh, wow. Crazy. So what does that mean then? Do they paint over it? Like how do they do that? I mean, does someone paint over the old paint and make it look better? Is that better? Like, isn't it better to be scratchy and all fucked up and the original painting? I know. I know. I know. It's, yeah, I guess it just depends on what you want. Right. I mean. But that's the problem with this painting. And I think that after buying it for $450 million, it's currently in controversial dispute as to whether or not it's actually the work of Leonardo da Vinci. Makes sense. So they wanted him to donate it to the Louvre in Paris. Yeah. But they were like, we're not going to put it next to the Mona Lisa. He wanted it to be next to the Mona Lisa as the male Mona Lisa. The Mona Lisa, the male Mona Lisa. And they're like, uh-uh. They're like, we don't, we don't, we're not going to give this the red stamp. We don't even know if this is real. Wow. Yeah. Interesting. Yeah. It's just, oh man, could you imagine that feeling of being rejected like that? And you're like, imagine you're that guy. You're that guy. I mean, this is the guy that allegedly killed Jamal Khashoggi for criticizing his regime. Yes. Right. And have you ever seen that movie The Dissident, which is an incredible movie, but Brian Fogel that details all the events that took place? Oh, no, I haven't seen that. Crazy. He's the one that's in possession of this painting and now it's currently on his yacht. So this $450 million painting is on his yacht. And so art fanatics are like, you can't have a painting on a yacht. Like that's... But if it sinks. Well, not just that. The climate. Like to have these... Oh, you're right. The seawater. Yes. To have these paintings. I mean, maybe you only had it for a day or maybe you only had it like to tell everybody you had it there. Yeah. Maybe he actually has it in a climate control room. I imagine he would. I mean, come on. I don't know. He's falling out of his mind. He's buying $450 million paintings. He might be paying on it right now. But that's nothing to... That's nothing to him. He might do whatever he wants. He can do whatever he wants. If you've got the kind of money for a $450 million painting, but it might not be legit. And apparently, so I go down a rabbit hole. Yes. Apparently there is a massive market for illegitimate paintings and people get robbed all the time. And there was in fact a guy who was a master. I believe there's a documentary about him. There's a big one on Netflix about this right now. I thought that's what you're getting at. Oh, like the Master Forgers? Well, there was a guy who was... That was his trade. What he would do is make fake Picassos. So he would make his own work, but in the style of Picasso and they would claim that this was a lost Picasso. And he sold these things for millions, millions of dollars. This is the Netflix one. This lady got... Made you look. They found she was selling fake shit for a long time. Oh, okay. Just a lot of people off. I've not seen that one. But there's a guy who was... He did time and he got released eventually. And he did time for creating fake masterpieces. And it's really crazy because the guy was insanely talented. His art was magnificent. But it wasn't for Michelangelo. But he conned people. Yeah, he conned people. But it was... It's weird. It's like it's so... My uncle said this to me once. This is really a funny thing. Because when I was a kid, I would pretend I brushed my teeth. But I really didn't brush my teeth. My uncle, my uncle Vinny, who's a really interesting guy, he's a very creative guy, he's an artist. And he said it's funny because I used to do the same thing. But once eventually I realized I put so much effort into pretending that I brushed my teeth that I could have just brushed my teeth with that same amount of effort and I wouldn't have to pretend. And I thought about it. I'm like, God damn, he's smart. I'm like, God damn, he's smart.