The Uncanny

Freud continues his interpretation of the vulture fantasy, now attributing the “demonic magic” of the Mona Lisa’s smile to the repressed emotions of da Vinci himself. The painting seems to distill the sense of femininity and the experience of love; Freud claims that “all the faces” (85) of da Vinci’s subjects contain something of this mystery, since da Vinci was able to “put so much of his own nature” into the works (85).

Freud links Mona Lisa’s smile with the complex occurrences of da Vinci’s childhood, and especially the fact that he had two mothers. His biological mother, according to the vulture story, kissed him with the fervency of an abandoned woman. Likewise, Leonardo’s own erotic longing is fulfilled in his representations of the “blissful union between male and female” in his androgynous figures (89).