Edward McCluney (b. 1944)
2016
Linocut on paper
5/30
Art Collection purchase
2017.33.1
Inspired by Leonardo da Vinci, Portrait of Lisa Gherardini (Mona Lisa), 1503
Musée du Louvre, Paris
Image source
Edward McCluney is a master printmaker and art educator who works and teaches at his studio in the Torpedo Factory Art Center in Alexandria, Virginia. In 2017 he generously donated more than 60 of his works on paper to Georgetown University. McCluney works predominantly in the relief technique, carving his images into linoleum and wood. Ramona Lisa is a portrait of his daughter attired in fanciful Renaissance garb. As McCluney later explained in an email to the curator, “I had my daughter in mind when I created the print, but based it loosely on my favorite painting in the world—The Mona Lisa. I had planned to make the piece a color reduction print but liked the black and white so much that I stopped there.”