Every Picture Hides a Story: The Secret Ways Artists Make Their Work More Seductive

Each year 11 million people trek to the Louvre to gawk at the Mona Lisa. Many visitors clutch guide books in hand describing the painting. For some, it’s the experience of a lifetime, one they’ll talk about with friends and family for decades.

Yet some modern researchers say that the vast majority of people will never recognize the hidden messages in this painting. That’s because those hidden messages are subliminal.

Buried below the threshold of conscious awareness, Da Vinci used techniques ...