What are the incredible "strange things" in the cultural circle?

With the deepening of the understanding of the art circle, more and more puzzles have been discovered. Sometimes, even these puzzles are worse than soap operas. Even so, we still try to explore these puzzles, especially after they were stolen, but the only person who knows the answer has long since passed away.

10. The girl with pearl earrings

Despite all kinds of reasonable guesses and scientific basis, no one knows the true identity of the girl in The Girl with Pearl Earrings painted by johannes vermeer in 1665.

Soft light scattered on the girl's face, and she slowly turned to us, revealing a big pearl earring hanging on her left ear. Girls are awkward and want to talk about it.

But will she be Johannes Vermeer's daughter? Or johannes vermeer's lover? Maybe she is not a real person, but once this painting was exhibited, it attracted everyone's attention.

In the17th century, this painting form was called "tronie" (that is, the head portrait popular in Holland in the17th century), which meant that the face and shoulders of the protagonist were decorated with striking or strange ornaments.

In this painting, the headscarf of the girl endows the portrait with oriental charm, and the oversized pearl earrings are used to arouse people's reverie, thus rendering a mysterious atmosphere.

I have to say that even Vermeer himself is a mystery. We only know that he lives in Delft, the Netherlands, has 15 children, and only painted 36 paintings in his life.

In these only works, the heroines lean against the simple decoration room, and the light and shadow of their faces interact vividly, making each work a masterpiece.

The mystery of Vermeer's paintings lies in the unexplained mysteries, and it is these mysteries that fascinate all spectators. The girl wearing pearl earrings is always a perfect example of these puzzles.

"The attraction of painting lies in its unsolved mystery," said tracy chevalier, a writer who has written a best-selling novel in the field of painting. "You can never answer that girl's thoughts.

Because once this mystery is solved, your attention will shift to other paintings. But if the mystery is not solved, you will go back to the painting again and again, trying to solve the mystery. This is the meaning of the work: we are eager to solve the mystery, but we can never solve it. "

9. Two lightning attacks

Barry Bowman, a cultural relic protector, was surprised to find another brand-new painting hidden under a masterpiece by Robert Reid, an American impressionist painter in the early 20th century.

This hidden painting, called "In the Garden", depicts a young woman reading a book while drinking tea outdoors. At that time, almost all artists made a painting on canvas, but Rhett extended one painting and created a second one. No one knows why Rhett did it, and he is dead, and he can't tell us why.

As for Rhett, we only know that he is a gambler. Struggling economically for a long time, he finally died in the worst era of the Great Depression.

Literary and art experts speculate that he may not really like this painting on the surface, but he may just create it to make money and survive; Or, he wants to store or express his second painting in a simpler way.

Strangely, this kind of thing happened twice in Indiana art circle in two years. In 20 12, the same thing happened to Bowman when he began to restore Tracy Steele's works for the Indiana Museum.

Although this is a great thing for the Indiana Museum. But for the art world, this is equivalent to two lightning strikes.

For the brower Museum in Valparaiso University, they now have not only one work by Robert Reed, but also two priceless treasures. In the future, these two works will attract many people to the museum for their unusual stories.

8. The love and betrayal experienced by Wally Neutsch.

Egon Schiele was a famous Austrian painter in the early 20th century, and Wally Neuzil was his muse. It is said that Neutsch is Schiller's lover. She has appeared in some of Schiller's paintings (including some pornographic paintings), which has brought great help to Schiller's career. Wally is the protagonist in 19 12 The Portrait of Wally, which is also known as the Vienna version of the Mona Lisa.

Neutsch was born in a poor family in Tadendorf, Austria. He met Schiller at the age of 16 and became his mannequin. However, people regard the art model as a prostitute.

However, this does not prevent the unusual feelings between Neutsch and Schiller from gradually fermenting with the passage of time. You can know a thing or two from the way she looks at Schiller.

Although Neutsch was infatuated with Schiller, Schiller finally abandoned her mercilessly. 19 15 years, Schiller married a woman who could give him money and status. We don't know if Neutsch and Schiller had any relationship after that.

The son of the founder of the Leopold Museum in Vienna said: "Neuzi has been unhappy since he was brutally abandoned. But in 19 13, she and Schiller also went to Lake Traun (near Salzburg, Austria) for a holiday with Rossler (also a mannequin of Schiller).

We also found their private photo albums. It can be found that after the two broke up, Neuch still kept in touch with the buyers of Schiller's paintings and collected Schiller's works. People certainly don't look down on her as before. "

7. David's secret weapon

What Michelangelo's statue of David holds in his right hand has always been controversial. Some people speculate that his huge right hand holds a weapon specially used for throwing stones, which is as long as 180 meters (600 feet).

According to the Bible, when David fought Goliath, he brought a slingshot, five stone heads and a shepherd's staff. /kloc-At the beginning of the 6th century, Michelangelo's statue of David only carved slings.

However, some scholars insist that there is an unknown thing in the sling from the shoulder to the right hand on David's portrait, which is considered to be the handle for fixing a long stick, just like a golf club.

Because the statue of David has been placed at the top of Florence Cathedral during the production process, people have no way to know the information about secret weapons. In fact, the sling in David's statue has appeared in other artists' paintings many times, and experts believe that this is probably the inspiration for Michelangelo's David statue.

Experts believe that the shepherd's stick did not appear in the sculpture because of political factors. Historian Sergio Risaliti said: "At that time, politicians thought that a shepherd's stick could not compare with the reputation of the first public statue in Italian history."

However, many scholars have questioned this. So what David has in his hand is still an unsolved mystery.

6. A statue of Jesus with real teeth

A 300-year-old statue was found in a small town in Mexico. To our surprise, this statue has real teeth. But no one knows where the teeth on the sculpture came from.

In the early religious tradition, it was very common for people to donate organs to the church. People often use animal bones to carve human hair or teeth and use them to decorate sculptures. But so far, this is the first time that human teeth have been found in sculpture.

This sculpture named "Quiet Jesus" was created between 17 and 18 centuries. In the process of restoring the sculpture, the laser scanner found that the human teeth in the sculpture were well preserved.

But until now, it is not clear whether these teeth were taken from the bodies of the living or the dead. Another possibility is that teeth are forcibly taken out of someone's body and donated without authorization.

What is even more surprising is that the mouth of the sculpture is completely closed, and the teeth are invisible unless you look into the mouth intentionally. But why do sculptors use a pair of teeth that are so well preserved?

Although there is no way to determine the identity of the donor, the researchers also want to determine the age and gender of the donor without pulling the tooth. "For modern people, it seems crazy," said the sculptor Fanny Unik El Ukol Sini. "But people's views on the human body at that time were really different from ours."

The portrait of a man is hidden on the woman ironing clothes.

The oil painting "The Woman Ironing Clothes" was damaged in a premeditated robbery, and it was Pablo Picasso's award-winning work in 1904. With the help of an infrared camera, people also found a second painting hidden in it.

The second painting is a portrait of a man with an upside-down beard. Scholars have been thinking about the identity of this person and whether this painting was written by Picasso. But what they have made clear is that this painting is not a self-portrait of Picasso.

Picasso was only 22 years old when he created this painting "The Woman Ironing Clothes". At this time, he was in a depressed stage, and everything in his life was covered with a gloomy color. Due to lack of funds, he often paints on canvas repeatedly.

Some experts believe that the brush strokes and colors used can prove that this hidden painting was written by Picasso, but the identity of the man in the painting has aroused heated discussion.

This man looks like another artist, maybe the sculptor Mateu Fernandez soto or the painter Ricard Canals. However, with the deepening of research, all previous speculations have been overturned.

In addition, a hidden portrait was also found in another masterpiece of Picasso, The Blue Room, which was also created in France during Picasso's Great Depression. Infrared technology shows us a man with a beard, a bow tie and a jacket.

The unusual brushwork at the top of this painting has prompted scientists and artists to make a deeper study of this painting. Similarly, this painting is not a self-portrait of Picasso, so everyone is speculating about the identity of the man in the painting and his relationship with Picasso.

"The audience really wants to know the answer," said Dorothy Coase, director of the Philip Collection. "It's a bit like detective work. People explore mysteries and add mystery to them through various channels. The more we know, the more we can appreciate the significance of this painting in Picasso's life. "

4. Homework by candlelight

Whether the painting "Work by Candlelight" is an original by Vincent Van Gogh or a fake as his nephew said is still controversial. This painting seems to be a self-portrait of Van Gogh, but strangely, one third of the bottom of the painting is incomplete, and that part is a Japanese kabuki painted with ink instead of paint.

Another doubt is that the French inscription "Etude a la bougie" (meaning "work by candlelight") on the painting is not marked with stress symbols for some reason.

The first buyer of this work was William Gotz, the boss of Universal Pictures. At that time, the painting had been proved to be genuine, but soon after, Van Gogh's nephew stood up and denied this statement, and he was supported by another expert.

Since then, the debate about the mystery of the authenticity of this painting has lasted for decades. In 2005, John Decker, a famous Hollywood forger, revealed in his book that it was he who forged this work in order to trick Gotz into buying it.

Although modern technology can detect the materials used in painting, who is the real author of this work by candlelight and why kabuki is added to canvas is still a difficult problem that technology cannot solve.

The truth of the matter may only be clear to Van Gogh himself, but unfortunately the mystery has been buried with him.

3. The missing ballet dancer

In the 1990s, how Edgar Dega's painting "Ballerina on tiptoe" disappeared from Huguette Clark's apartment, whether it was given away or stolen, no one knows the answer.

When the FBI found this famous painting in the home of Henry Bloch, a collector and one of the founders of Bloch Tax Company, Clark stopped the FBI from further investigation on the grounds that it involved his privacy. Although Clark never admitted that the famous painting was stolen, the legal dispute between her and Brock was inevitable.

Because Brock bought this famous painting through legal channels, the judge is also hesitant to judge the ownership of this painting according to the principle that whoever finds it belongs to it.

In the end, the two sides reached a complicated agreement: because Brock originally intended to donate the painting to Nelson Atkins Art Museum, the painting will be returned to Clark in name, and then donated to the museum in Clark's name through his lawyer.

In this way, Clark saved a lot of taxes, and the Brocks enjoyed the right to hold this famous painting for life. It was not until their death that the painting was sent to the museum for collection.

When concluding the agreement, the museum insisted that Clark's doctor in charge must swear that she was mentally healthy enough to make a legal donation decision at the age of 102. Finally, Dr. Henry S. Singman provided this certificate.

However, this agreement was in crisis because of Clark's will storm in 2005. At that time, Clark signed two different wills. The second one deprived his relatives of the right of inheritance, but included relevant people including Dr. sigman who was sworn in that year in the list of heirs.

If her relatives win the lawsuit and successfully abolish the second will, then her previous agreement with Brock will probably be invalid.

What was Clark's mental state when he drafted his second will? Has this decision she made been influenced by some people who covet her inheritance? Assuming Clark had no capacity for civil conduct when she signed her will in 2005, when she signed an agreement with Brock in 2008, her mental state would probably get the same ruling.

Clark died in 20 1 1 at the age of 104. This case has thus become confusing.

2. The relationship between Connecticut and Gardner robbery

1990, the world's largest art theft happened in the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston. Edgar Degas, Rembrandt and Jane Vermeer's masterpieces worth 500 million dollars were stolen by two men dressed as policemen.

At that time, FBI agent Paul Cavanagh said, "This theft gang spent a lot of time studying museums. This is a professional crime. "

20 10 The wife of Robert Guarente, a robber who died, told the police that she had asked robert king Gentile to hide two or three masterpieces stolen from Gardner Museum before her husband died.

The FBI thinks that Gentile is an old rascal. After Gentile took a polygraph to test whether she had failed in the theft, Gentile took another test.

He admitted that he had seen the stolen Rembrandt self-portrait, and this lie detector showed that he was telling the truth. Then Gentile claimed that Guarente's widow showed him the painting and said it would be her pension.

Gentile succeeded in putting the blame on the woman who had accused him. But he didn't have a chance to make more confessions.

When Gentile was in prison, FBI agents investigated his property in Connecticut, looking for evidence of theft. In the basement of gentile's house, they found a piece of paper with 13 stolen works of art and their valuation on the black market. This paper was stuffed in an old newspaper that reported the theft.

Gentile's son told FBI agents that his father hid all his valuables in a plastic container under his fake floor. But FBI agents didn't find anything under the floor.

Then Gentile's son said that a storm washed away the hut and destroyed everything under the floor, and his father was still sad for a long time. When asked again, Gentile still said nothing about the theft.

Considering that he was over 70 years old and in poor health, gentile was only sentenced to 30 months' imprisonment and released in February 20 14. But in March of 20 13, the FBI studio in Boston issued a public statement saying that they thought Gardner's theft was organized theft.

And said that they already know who stole those masterpieces, and those masterpieces have been sent to Connecticut and Philadelphia. But they never revealed more details about the theft.

But according to their sources, many newspapers think that David Turner is the organizer of the theft, Robert Guarente is responsible for hiding the stolen masterpieces, and robert king Tell defends their theft.

The FBI hopes that this announcement will let the public go to their garages and attics to see if there are any hidden masterpieces. If someone talks about information about the lost masterpiece on the phone, his phone will be monitored.

But none of these things happened. The investigation of the theft was also drowned out by the explosion of the Boston Marathon.

1. Another Mona Lisa

Many people think that there is only one Mona Lisa in the world, and this famous Mona Lisa is kept in the Louvre in Paris, France.

However, the second Mona Lisa was created by Leonardo da Vinci or one of his students. It was created almost at the same time as the Mona Lisa in the Louvre and was hidden in the Prado Museum. Compared with the original painting, the two paintings adopt a slightly different perspective painting method, which can produce a 3D effect.

Some investigators wrote in the book "The Sixth Sense": "When these two Mona Lisa are put together for comparison, the stereoscopic effect of the second painting may be the first work with 3D effect in world history."

They also think that in this painting, the mountain behind the Mona Lisa is created on a separate canvas, which is no different from what we see in the portrait studio now.

However, experts have different opinions on whether these two works were created at the same time and whether this 3D effect was discovered by accident after creation.

Another amazing discovery is that there is a third Mona Lisa in the world-Elvis MonaLisa, which is an earlier version than the original Mona Lisa. The Mona Lisa in this painting is ten years younger than the two mentioned above.

Will this painting be a missing clue to the study of Leonardo da Vinci's early and late works? Is it fake or genuine?

It seems that the Mona Lisa in Elvas was created by Leonardo da Vinci while he was alive, but that doesn't mean that this work was made by Leonardo himself. Among the many students of Leonardo da Vinci, there may be one or two students who have developed and innovated in the original works of Leonardo da Vinci.

In addition, Leonardo da Vinci's paintings are mostly painted on boards, and this Mona Lisa in Elvas is painted on canvas. Is it because da Vinci wanted to try different techniques? Or is the creator someone else? If many experts agree that Leonardo da Vinci's works are true, then why did he paint the Mona Lisa at least twice?

Many experts are having an ongoing debate to answer our long-standing questions about the authenticity of these works. But now the Mona Lisa Ellsworth is still intact, which makes us wonder if it really has a history of 500 years. At least one expert thinks that it seems impossible for a painting to remain so complete after such a long time.