5 Masterpieces Painted by Leonardo da Vinci

Before her face launched a million souvenirs, the "Mona Lisa" was likely Lisa Gherardini—a Florentine mother of five leading a quiet, middle-class life. While the art world long admired da Vinci’s revolutionary three-quarter pose, the painting didn't achieve international icon status until the morning of August 21, 1911, when—in an audacious heist—Italian handyman Vincenzo Peruggia hid in a Louvre broom closet, waited for nightfall and walked out with the masterpiece tucked under his coat. 

The theft ignited a global media frenzy. Police interrogated everyone from Pablo Picasso to American tycoon J.P. Morgan, while crowds flocked to the Louvre just to stare at the empty space where the missing lady once hung.

It took two years to recover the painting; Peruggia was eventually caught in Italy, claiming he wanted to return the work to its fatherland. By the time she returned to Paris, the "Mona Lisa" was an international icon.

"The Last Supper," depicting the moment Christ reveals to his disciples that one of them will betray him, is a testament to da Vinci’s genius. Its history is also a chronicle of near-obliteration. Da Vinci famously shunned traditional fresco techniques—which bond pigment to wet plaster—in favor of an experimental dry method using oil and tempera. The gamble failed; the paint began flaking from the wall of the Santa Maria delle Grazie almost before the brushes were dry.

The elements were only the beginning of the painting's trials. In 1652, monks committed a notable sacrilege by cutting a doorway through the bottom of the mural, effectively severing the feet of Jesus. Centuries later, Napoleon’s invading troops used the refectory as a stable, reportedly using the mural for target practice.

The painting's greatest miracle, however, occurred in August 1943. Allied bombs leveled most of the church, but the wall containing "The Last Supper"—protected by a massive reinforcement of sandbags—remained standing amidst the ruins.

This portrait of Cecilia Gallerani is stunning due to its psychological depth—and the way her body position potentially hints at an illicit affair. Its 20th-century history is a wartime thriller. During World War II, the painting was seized by the Nazis during their looting of Poland and sent to Germany to be part of Hitler’s planned Führermuseum—an unrealized museum in Austria intended to house a grand collection of looted art.

It was later discovered in the home of Hans Frank, the Nazi governor-general of occupied Poland, who had kept it for his private enjoyment.

After the war, it was recovered by the Monuments Men—a specialized Allied unit aimed at reclaiming lost art—and returned to Kraków. Today, it remains a symbol of Polish national identity, a survivor of the regime that attempted to erase the nation’s culture.

No painting attributed to da Vinci captures the intersection of art, greed and mystery quite like the "Salvator Mundi." Dubbed the “Lost Leonardo,” this depiction of Christ vanished from the historical record for over 200 years. When it resurfaced at a small regional auction in 2005, it was heavily over-painted and mistaken for a cheap copy.

After years of meticulous restoration and authentication, the art world was rocked again in 2017, when the painting sold at Christie’s for a record-shattering $450.3 million.

The intrigue didn't end with the final sale. Since then, the artwork has effectively vanished from public view once again, fueling rumors that it is being held on a private yacht or in a high-security vault in the Middle East. It remains one of the world’s most expensive—and most elusive—private treasures.

Commissioned in 1481 for the Augustinian monks of San Donato, "The Adoration of the Magi" stands as a haunting mystery in art history. Da Vinci never finished the work; instead he departed for Milan a year later, leaving behind a chaotic, amber-hued image of horses, knights and biblical figures. For centuries, the painting was viewed as a messy sketch, but modern forensic technology has revealed a masterpiece hidden in plain sight.

In 2002, infrared reflectography allowed researchers to "peer" beneath the darkened top layers of paint. What they found was a cinematic revelation: Da Vinci had sketched out an entirely different scene than what is visible to the naked eye.

Beneath the grime lay a bloody battle scene and the construction of a pagan temple. It’s proof that even in his youth, da Vinci’s mind was a whirlwind of complex, often contradictory, narratives that he couldn't always complete.