PARIS – The “Mona Lisa” found herself all alone. The coronavirus had emptied her room at the Louvre Museum of its usual throngs of admirers.
In a silence worthy of a cathedral, she could gaze undisturbed at the huge canvas on the opposite wall, “The Wedding Feast at Cana” that shows Christ surrounded by 130 feast-goers, painted centuries before social distancing became a thing.But now, sigh, the world’s most famous portrait must go back to the grindstone after four months of virus-imposed inactivity.
Even with that famously enigmatic smile, the job of luring back crowds to the world's most-visited museum promises to be tough.Before mass tourism came to a screeching halt with the coronavirus pandemic, the Louvre drew 30,000 to 50,000.