After 14 years of remaining in the same room, Leonardo Da Vinci's Mona Lisa has left the “States Hall” of the Louvre Museum, and has been temporarily relocated to the "Medici Hall”. The need to relocate the Mona Lisa is due to the remodeling work that has been carried out at the Louvre Museum over the last 5 years. Finally it is the turn to renovate the States Hall, which is the most visited in the entire museum and the one that has suffered the most wear and tear.

According to Artsy, the States Room receives approximately 22,500 visitors a day who want to see the Mona Lisa. It is expected that by October the work will be back in the Hall of States, just in time for the stellar exhibition of the 500th anniversary of the death of the Renaissance artist.

The difficulties of moving the Mona Lisa

In an interview with the BBC, Catriona Pearson of the Ashmolean Museum at the University of Oxford says that “The risk of moving a piece does not change regardless of the value of the work; We always move the pieces in the same way: very, very, very carefully!” According to Pearson, some of the ways in which risks are minimized are the choice of schedule, looking for less crowded hours (in the case of the Mona Lisa, it was chosen at night when the museum is closed), reducing the number of people necessary to participate in the transfer, and a test exercise with a piece of wood that simulates the size and weight of the work.

"We make a piece of wood the size of the object and we go through the route to verify because, sometimes, there are angles in the corners and objects that leave you a tighter space than you expected. You can measure them, but until you try to take the piece to the site you won't notice," he adds.

Another factor that must be monitored is the temperature and humidity conditions necessary for the piece. In the specific case of the Mona Lisa, due to its age and fragility, it needs a constant temperature of 20° C and a humidity of 50% for its correct conservation.

45 years without leaving France

Due to its great historical and artistic value, the Mona Lisa has been moved very rarely, either within the Louvre Museum, or outside of France. The last time Mona Lisa was moved was in 2005 for renovation work. In 1963, at the request of Jackie Kennedy, the work was exhibited at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, despite protests by the French over the possibility of it suffering some damage. The last time the work left France was in 1974 when it was sent to Russia and Japan, 45 years ago.

With information from BBC, ABC News and Artsy.