AN Australian copy of one of the most famous paintings in the world, the Mona Lisa, will be on display in the Treasures Gallery at the National Library of Australia in December.

The copy was painted by Port Adelaide born artist Mortimer Menpes at a time when Australians had no access to see the great European masterpieces.

Arts Minister Simon Crean and Member for Canberra Gai Brodtmann today inspected the copy as Library preservation experts prepared it for display.

“Between 1900 and 1909…Menpes painted this Mona Lisa, as part of a 38-piece collection of copies donated to the Australian Government,” Crean says.

“As international debate rages about whether recent research has revealed a second da Vinci Mona Lisa, or a copy, Menpes’ skilful work is a reminder of an age when copying skills were highly regarded.

“In 1911, Menpes donated his copies of Great Masters to the Commonwealth Parliamentary Library, Australia’s earliest national cultural institution.

“Back in those days, Australians preferred international art, but local artists such as Arthur Streeton and Tom Roberts were developing a new language for Australian landscape painting.”

Crean says this lack of confidence led to a “cultural cringe”, when anything Australian was not considered as good as British and European.

“These days, particularly as home to the world’s oldest living culture, we are proud of our Indigenous work, and proudly hang works of Nolan and Boyd alongside international peers,” he says.

“It’s our art that the world is seeing – this month Quai Branly museum in Paris hosts an exhibition of Australian Indigenous Western Desert art.

“It’s a two-way street, with the Toulouse-Lautrec exhibition travelling from Paris to the National Gallery of Australia to run from December 14 until April 2 next year.”

Menpes’ Mona Lisa will join the National Library of Australia’s NLA to Z exhibition at the Treasures Gallery from early December. In its first year, the Gallery attracted more than 120,000 visitors.

Menpes talent was recognised when he became a protégé of British Master James McNeill Whistler and his copies are regarded as skilful and convincing in their execution.

Today his 38 work collection is valued at close to $1 million. All pieces featured in The Great Masters by Mortimer Menpes exhibition at the National Library of Australia in 2002, attracting 22,000 visitors.