Mona Lisa speaks
2006-05-31 11:23
Tokyo - The Mona Lisa's smile may always remain a mystery, but it is now possible to hear what her voice would have sounded like, thanks to a Japanese acoustics expert.
Dr Matsumi Suzuki, who generally uses his skills to help with criminal investigations, measured the face and hands of Leonardo da Vinci's famous 16th century portrait to estimate her height at 168cm and create a model of her skull.
"Once we have that, we can create a voice very similar to
that of the person concerned," Suzuki told Reuters in an
interview at his Tokyo office last week.
"We have recreated the voices of a lot of famous people that were very close to the real thing and have been used in film dubbing."
Voice print
The chart of any individual's voice, known as a voice print,
is unique to that person and Suzuki says he believes he has
achieved 90% accuracy in recreating the quality of the
enigmatic woman's speaking tone.
"I am the Mona Lisa. My true identity is shrouded in
mystery," the portrait proclaims on a website at
http://promotion.msn.co.jp/davinci/voice.htm
"In Mona Lisa's case, the lower part of her face is quite
wide and her chin is pointed," Suzuki explained. "The extra
volume means a relatively low voice, while the pointed chin adds
mid-pitch tones," he added.
Japanese didn't suit her
The scientists brought in an Italian woman to add the necessary intonation to the voice.
"We then had to think about what to have her say," Suzuki
said. "We tried having her speak Japanese, but it didn't suit
her image."
Experts disagree over who was represented in the portrait,
with some saying the smiling woman is Leonardo himself, or his
mother.
Leonardo's voice
The team also attempted to recreate Leonardo's own voice in
a project timed to coincide with the release of the film The Da
Vinci Code. Suzuki said he was less confident about its
accuracy because he had to work from self-portraits where the
artist wore a beard, concealing the shape of his face.
Suzuki's work has made contributions to criminal
investigations - in one case after he successfully aged a
person's voice by a decade. A recording of the voice was
broadcast on television, leading to the apprehension of a
suspect.