Abstract
In previous writings, I have argued that a three-to-five-year-old boy's emotional separation from his mother is the key experience in his development of a melancholic orientation to life, and that men's religious proclivities (based on honor, hope, and humor) reflect this emotional separation. In the present essay, I argue that Leonardo da Vinci's {Mona Lisa} is the iconic center of the religion of male melancholia, and thus displaces the Virgin Mary of traditional Christianity in this regard. I provide evidence in support of this argument by focusing on Walter Pater's essay on Leonardo da Vinci, and interpreting Vincent Peruggia's theft, Hugo Villegas's stoning, and Marcel Duchamp and others' humorous assaults on the dignity of Mona Lisa as expressions of male melancholia. I conclude that the painting aids in the difficult task of transforming melancholia into mourning.
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Capps, D. Leonardo's Mona Lisa: Iconic Center of Male Melancholic Religion. Pastoral Psychology 53, 107–137 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1023/B:PASP.0000046824.55543.2c
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/B:PASP.0000046824.55543.2c