Vincenzo Peruggia

Pietro Vincenzo Antonio Peruggia (8 October 18818 October 1925) was an Italian decorator best known for stealing the Mona Lisa from the Louvre, a museum in Paris where he had briefly worked as glazier, on 21 August 1911.

Early life and work at the Louvre

Pietro Vincenzo Antonio Peruggia was born on 8 October 1881 in Dumenza, a small village in the Alps of Italy near the border with Switzerland to Celeste Rossi and Giacomo Peruggia. For a brief period after having moved to Paris in 1908, Peruggia obtained work at the Louvre, cleaning and reframing paintings. His job also required him to construct strong cases for some of the artwork in the museum, including the one for the Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci; he was likely involved in Mona Lisas box frame construction and would have known how to open it in minutes. After the painting was stolen, a curator investigated the matter and listed all the names involved, including Peruggia's. There was not much security at the Louvre, and its entry was free.

Theft

thumb|upright|alt=Three men in suits and hats stand examining the framed Mona Lisa painting displayed on two benches in an ornate room|The Mona Lisa in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, 1913. Museum director Giovanni Poggi (right) inspects the painting.

In 1911, Peruggia perpetrated what has been described as the greatest art theft of the 20th century. According to Peruggia's later interrogation in Florence, following his arrest on 12 December 1913, he said that he entered the Louvre on Monday, 21 August 1911, at around 7 am, through the door where the other Louvre workers were entering, wearing one of the white smocks that museum employees customarily wore, making himself indistinguishable from the other workers. It was a quiet morning, and the Louvre was nearly empty, because 21 August was the weekly closure day during the summer holidays. and the Mona Lisa measures approximately , so it would not fit under a smock worn by someone of his size. Instead, he told investigators that he took off his smock and wrapped it around the painting, before tucking it under his arm, and left the Louvre through the same door he had entered.

When Peruggia hid the painting, he was stuck by a locked service door. A plumber, thinking he was an employee (Peruggia had finished working for the Louvre), unlocked the door for him, and Peruggia successfully left the museum. The theft was not discovered until the following day, when a painter who was about to do a copy of the Mona Lisa found it missing. The director, who was on holiday, had boasted "steal the Mona Lisa? That would be like thinking that someone could steal the towers of Notre Dame cathedral." and all passengers of an ocean liner set to sail were also searched. It was only after Peruggia had failed to come to the police station twice that the police went to his apartment, where the painting was hidden. The detective failed to see it and believed Peruggia's explanations. Geri's story conflicts with Peruggia's, but it was clear that Peruggia expected a reward for returning the painting to what he regarded as its homeland. Geri called in Giovanni Poggi, director of the Uffizi, who authenticated the painting. Poggi and Geri, after taking the painting for safekeeping, informed the police, who arrested Peruggia at his hotel. The New York Times ran the headline, "Florentines in riot over 'Mona Lisa'. Crowd of 30,000 sweeps police aside in mad rush to see stolen painting."

Motivations

There are two predominant theories regarding the theft of the Mona Lisa. Peruggia said he did it for a patriotic reason as he wanted to bring the painting back for display in Italy, Perhaps sincere in his motive, Peruggia proclaimed "I am an Italian and I do not want the picture given back to the Louvre", and may not have known that Leonardo da Vinci took this painting as a gift for King Francis I when he moved to France to become a painter in his court during the 16th century, 250 years before Napoleon's birth. Experts question the patriotism motive on grounds ‌were patriotism the true ‌Peruggia would have donated the painting to an Italian museum rather than have attempted to profit from its sale. The question of money is also confirmed by letters that Peruggia sent to his father after the theft. On 22 December 1911, four months after the theft, he wrote that Paris was where "I will make my fortune and that his [fortune] will arrive in one shot." The following year, he wrote: "I am making a vow for you to live long and enjoy the prize that your son is about to realize for you and for all our family."

Put on trial, the court agreed to some extent that Peruggia committed his crime for patriotic reasons and gave him a lenient sentence. He was sent to jail for one year and 15 days but was hailed as a great patriot in Italy and on appeal served only seven months.

Later life

Peruggia was released from jail after a short time and served in the Italian army during World War I. During the war, he was captured by Austria-Hungary and held as a prisoner of war for two years until the war ended and he was released. He later married Annunciata Rossi, had one daughter named Celestina (1924–2011), returned to France, and continued to work as a painter decorator using his birth name Pietro Peruggia. He died from a heart attack on 8 October 1925 (his 44th birthday) in the Paris suburb of Saint-Maur-des-Fossés. He was buried in the Condé Cemetery of Saint-Maur-des-Fossés.

In popular culture

Peruggia's theft is part of popular culture, and over the years it has been celebrated in books, films, and songs including "Mona Lisa" written in 1978 by Ivan Graziani. In Der Raub der Mona Lisa (1931), an early German sound film, Peruggia was portrayed by Willi Forst.

In an April 1956 episode of the TV show You Are There, called "The Recovery of the Mona Lisa (December 10, 1913)", Peruggia is played by Vito Scotti, who reprised the role in another TV reconstruction of the famous theft, this time for the TV-show GE True. The episode was called "The Tenth Mona Lisa" and aired in March 1963. Liana Bortolon's book The Life and Times of Leonardo also mentioned the theft.

George Chakiris played Peruggia in The Mona Lisa Has Been Stolen (1966).

In The Man Who Stole La Gioconda (it) (2006), a television miniseries, Peruggia was portrayed by Alessandro Preziosi.

In March 2012, Peruggia's mugshot was sold for €3,825 to an Italian buyer by the Parisian auction house Tajan. The small original silver gelatin print (123 x 54 mm) had been estimated by photography expert Jean-Mathieu Martini at between €1,500 and €1,800, excluding fees. The mugshot was taken in 1909 by Alphonse Bertillon, the inventor of the anthropometry system. In the summer of 2012, Peruggia's character was the hero of a play that depicted him as a patriot. The play was performed in his hometown of Dumenza, Lombardy. In a 2018 episode of Drunk History on Comedy Central, he was portrayed by Jack Black. In a 2023 episode of Murdoch Mysteries called "Murdoch and the Mona Lisa", he was portrayed by Johnathan Sousa. In the 2024 Summer Olympics opening ceremony, the theft is referenced by the Minions when they stole the Mona Lisa painting from its protective chamber.

References

Bibliography

External links

Mona Lisa Is Missing (formerly The Missing Piece), a 2012 documentary by Joe Medeiros
"The Mystery of the Misplaced Mona Lisa", a short mystery story by Ron Katz