PARIS.- The Louvre museum presents new work by Franco-Chinese artist Yan Pei-Ming. The central piece of the show is the work “The Funeral of Mona Lisa”, placed in a room next to the original Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci. Pei-Ming’s version shows a giant, grey Mona Lisa with tears in her eyes and streaks of paint running down her front goes on display at the Louvre museum this week in the room next to the original by Leonardo da Vinci. The Louvre wants to bring contemporary art face-to-face with the masterpieces of old. The exhibition features five works. In the center is the large grey Mona Lisa, framed by two images that portray grey clouds dotted with images of skulls modeled on scans of the painter's head. A portrait of Yan’s father and a self-portrait in a death-like pose are placed at the far ends.

Artist Yan Pei-Ming stated the works were "a homage and a funeral" for Mona Lisa. The exhibition will be on view through May 18.

Yan Pei-Ming grew up in Shanghai and moved to France in 1982. His most famous paintings are over-dimensioned Mao portraits worked out in fast, thick brush strokes of only a few colours, usually black and white or red and white. Hence, his canvas appears to be abstract close up, but the motif becomes more and more evident with distance.

Yan Pei Ming's artworks include other enormous portraits of important figures such as Buddha or Bruce Lee as well as auto portraits. His last painting's model was the French Prime minister Dominique de Villepin, and was exhibited at the Gran Palais in spring 2006. Yan Pei-Ming lives and works in Dijon.