Controversial expansion of the Mona Lisa called 'staggeringly terrible'

Art lovers have been left upset about an expansion made to one of the most famous paintings in the world.

The Mona Lisa was painted by Leonardo da Vinci in 1503 and famously hangs in the Louvre in Paris where it is viewed by hundreds of visitors daily.

It is a half-length portrait painting measuring 77 x 53 cm. But now, with the help of artificial intelligence, it has been made larger with its “predicted” background filled in leaving art fans fuming.

The controversial expansion was implemented by “AI Interpreter” Kody Young, who used the technology to predict and fill in the background of some of the world’s most priceless pieces of art.

Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter

In a Twitter thread, he explained: “Ever wonder what the rest of the Mona Lisa looks like?

“Got @Adobe Firefly to help fill out the background for me with the power of AI. Here's what the backgrounds of the most famous paintings in the world look like with AI.”

The expanded image of the original Mona Lisa showed mountains, clouds and jagged rocks in the background.

While the exercise demonstrated the power of AI, many were unhappy with the idea of there being more beyond the original canvas that the artist worked on.

One annoyed person wrote: “This is staggeringly terrible and wrong on so many levels. Totally disrespects the artists and their creative decisions. People should not be appropriating and vandalising artists’ work like this.”

Another simply stated, “No one’s wondered this”.

Someone else argued: “Dog it's called a PORTRAIT for a reason. There is no ‘the rest of the Mona Lisa’.”

“These people have a foundational misunderstanding about art. The rest of the background isn’t important to the image, that’s why the artist chose not to include it.

“This is a beautiful portrait, and including a bunch of mountains and clouds and s**t doesn’t add anything to it,” wrote another.

Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.