By: Marcia Abramson
It has recreated an interest in tours by not only Americans but blas Parisians. The lines are as long as I remember them in revisiting the Louvre Museum where the Mona Lisa has been on display for many, many years. My renewed interest in the Mona Lisa began at least 40 decades ago when my late husband, Martin, was assigned by a national magazine to write about the noted art connoisseur, Maurice Goldblatt of Notre Dane University . Professor Goldblatt had gained a reputation in the art world for his ability to detect a fake painting by studying the age of the paint pigment and the age of the canvas or material that it was painted on. He showed us the chemicals he used as well as his trusty microscope. The original Mona Lisa was stolen in 1911 by one of the custodians at the Louvre. It was not uncommon for many excellent fake Mona Lisas to surface. Professor Goldblatt was also the curator of the Chicago Museum of Art. In that capacity he was called in to authenticate some of the Mona Lisa paintings. He told us that he had little difficulty in exposing the fakes with his scientific method. The unscrupulous dealers were then detained by the police and French authorities to answer questions about the fraudulent paintings. Part of our research necessitated our visit to Paris, where we joined the usual and unusual crowds of recent vintage crowds to view the Mona Lisa. My husband's first reaction was that the painting was very small and years later one of the characters in Dan Brown's book had the same reaction to this masterpiece. Paris is the locale for most of the events in the novel and has become a "bread and butter" phenomenon for many tour leaders, art historians and Da Vinci authorities whose expertise is finding a lucrative tourism market and bringing back the American tourists. The Americans are returning home as experts after visiting all the sites mentioned by Dan Brown as well as the symbols and legends detailed in the book. They can be seen at the Ritz Hotel and the more affluent have made this their luxurious home away from home to do their research. An enterprising California real estate broker, Olivia Hsu Decker, who deals only in high end properties, just so happens to own the 17th century Chateau de Villette outside of Paris where the eccentric British art historian and his ne'er do well manservant live and where the award-winning director/producer Ron Howard will be filming part of the movie for Columbia Pictures. Ms. Decker sold her first four-day Da Vinci Tour to a group of acquaintances through a school fund raising auction for $15,000 each. If you are interested in a weeklong tour with lodging and a daily breakfast, the price goes up to $55,000. The property also has 15 bedrooms and is on 250 acres of beautiful countryside.I am told that a group of feminist theologians and spiritual advisers are planning tours and seminars in Southern France around the cult of Mary Magdalen. In his book Brown theorizes that Jesus and Mary Magdalen were husband and wife and that their descendants became the first kings of France. According to French Legend Mary Magdalen and (Brown's book), she lived in exile for the next three decades in a cave near Marseille. After her death, her bones were buried in the Basilica of St. Maximin of Provence. Many Catholics feel that his story, which is depicted in "The Last Supper," is part of the centuries-old tradition of French anticlericalism. I would suggest that if you are one of the minority of people who have not read Dan Brown's extremely well researched The Da Vinci Code, you might find it even more exciting if you are familiar with the most important painting in the Louvre, its location in that venerable building, the Ritz Hotel, Chateau country and the Bois de Bologna, and the other locales mentioned in the popular thriller. You can actually do a tour of these places on your own as we did. Your local travel professional can also provide invaluable assistance.
Copyright by Marcia AbramsonE-mail: mascribe@aol.com
