Leonardo worked slowly, endlessly adjusting details nobody else would have noticed. I stood in the shadows of his studio photographing him while the exhausted woman posing as Mona Lisa struggled to maintain her expression. At one point she opened her mouth in a silent yawn, and Leonardo smiled slightly, as though fatigue itself interested him artistically. The room smelled of oil paint, wood, dust, and human patience. Watching him paint was unsettling. He did not merely observe faces - he seemed to dissect thought itself. I suddenly understood why his portraits feel alive centuries later. Leonardo was not painting appearances. He was painting consciousness.
