Word From the Weird

Brandon Powell Smith

Should you take an article released on April Fool's Day seriously? Probably not. Anyway, J. Antonio Farfan is giving a lecture on his theories about Leonardo da Vinci's Last Supper Thursday, April 9th at 6 pm at Bering and James Gallery. Monterrey, Mexico native Farfan has researched the Last Supper since its restoration in the 1990s and believes that numbers are hidden in the image that have been left uninterpreted. Here's a clip from the press release:

"Farfan is the author of "Cerca Trova: The Last Words of Leonardo da Vinci" published in 2006. The book outlines arcane clues Farfan detected as he studied the ancient portrait, Mona Lisa. In the book, he provides an answer to one of the most mysterious questions in art history: Who is the Mona Lisa and what does she represent?

Farfan’s answer was new to the art world. He said the woman with the enigmatic smile is Deborah, a little-known prophet and military leader described in the Old Testament.

“The theory about the ‘Last Supper,’" said Farfan, "builds on my findings about the Mona Lisa, where I point out the significance of the Roman numerals hidden within the Mona Lisa’s hands. My newest theory strengthens the previous one by placing a clear link between the literature in Leonardo’s library and the Fathers of the Church. The web-based method of research used by Farfan mimics the similarities between this technology-based era and that of the renewal of literary investigation in the Renaissance."