Since it was painted, there have been many parodies of Leonardo da Vinci`s Mona Lisa, but she has remained an unknown woman, a famous woman, without characteristics or background. Nick decided that here was a model, giving the Treadwell gallery artists the opportunity to make clear the individuality of their treatment of a single subject. Furthermore, it was likely to inspire humour, and since it was such a historic and publicly well known image, it would certainly be a very entertaining and easily promotable theme exhibition. In fact, the Treadwell Gallery`s 1974 “Mona Lisa Show” received world wide publicity, including a four page article in the American Art News by the legendary critic, Peter Fuller( 1947-1990). Works were lent to the Duisberg Museum(Germany) for their later exhibition and six of the thirty five exhibited works were published in Mary Rose Storey`s book on the Mona Lisas, Published by Abrams, New York. A few years after the event, Nick was pleased to receive a request for a copy of the catalogue from the Louvre.
