The smile of Mona Lisa has long remained a mystery, but now we can hear her voice, thanks to a Japanese sound expert.
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| Portrait of Mona Lisa. (Photo: promotion.msn) |
Dr. Matsumi Suzuki, who frequently applies his skills to assist in criminal investigations, measured the face and hands of the beauty depicted in Leonardo da Vinci’s famous 16th-century portrait. He discovered her height to be 1.68 meters, from which he created a skull model.
“Once we had the skull, we created a voice similar to what her real voice would have been,” Suzuki stated.
“We have recreated the voices of many famous individuals that closely match their actual voices and have been used for dubbing.”
Each person’s voice chart is unique, and Suzuki believes he has achieved 90% accuracy in creating the voice of this mysterious woman.
“I am Mona Lisa. My identity remains shrouded in mystery,” the painting claims on the website: promotion.msn.co.jp/davinci/voice.htm
“In Mona Lisa, the lower part of her face is quite wide, and her chin is pointed,” Suzuki explained. “A wider space corresponds to a relatively deep voice, while a pointed chin adds a bit of pitch.”
Scientists also added a touch of Italian intonation to her voice. “We tried having her speak Japanese, but it did not suit her features.”
Experts have long debated who the subject of the painting is; some say it is a representation of Leonardo himself, while others believe it is the artist’s mother.
The team also recreated Leonardo’s voice to coincide with the release of the film The Da Vinci Code. Suzuki mentioned that he is less confident about the accuracy of this voice because the image of the artist in the self-portrait features a thick beard that obscures his face.
M.T.
