Virgil Abloh MonaLisa Lightbox

This backlit MonaLisa is Virgil Abloh’s tribute to Leonardo da Vinci’s iconic painting, blurring the boundary between functionality and art.

Designer: Virgil Abloh

Manufacturer: IKEA

Materials: Backlit lightbox with cord

Country of Origin: Sweden

Date: 2019

Dimensions: 20.87” W x 30.32” H x 2.76" D

IKEA’s MARKERAD [“marked” in Swedish] was a limited-edition collection designed in collaboration with famed designer, Virgil Abloh launched in the Fall of 2019. The pieces display Abloh’s distinctive style of minimalism—simple colors and clean lines, doused in ironic and intentional design interruptions. 

His wall art, a light-up Mo na Lisa, plays with the idea of accessibility and art: while Da Vinci’s version is shielded behind glass at the Louvre, priceless, this one, with an USB port, can also charge your iPhone.

Virgil Abloh (September 30, 1980 – November 28, 2021) was an American fashion designer and entrepreneur. He was CEO of the Milan-based Off-White, a fashion house he founded in 2013. Beginning in 2018 he was also the artistic director of Louis Vuitton’s menswear collection. A trained architect, Abloh was named by Time magazine as one of 2018’s 100 most influential people in the world. He brought the same disruptive approach to his work in furniture and product design with international brands including Braun, Vitra, Bacarrat, and IKEA among others.