The Mona Lisa also served as an inspiration for many artists, poets and writers, not the least of which is Michael Field. Michael Field is the pseudonym for Katherine Bradley (1846-1914) and Edith Cooper (1862-1913), an aunt and niece wrote poetry and verse drama together and lived as a married couple. It’s important to understand how women were viewed during the Victorian period in which the Fields lived. Katherine and Edith lived during a time where women didn’t have a voice and women were heavily discriminated against based on their sex.@Patricia Caplan. The Cultural construction of sexuality. New York: Routledge, 1997. Women were assigned a specific role in society; anything that deviated outside of that was seen as abnormal. That is why Katherine and Edith adopted the pseudonym Michael Field- they believed that in order to be taken seriously, they needed the authority that comes along with a male name. They could write whatever they wanted without being judged on their gender, and would have access to the male demographic that was so influential. It ensured their writings would not be immediately dismissed, and they were effectively able to transcend gender boundaries.@Margaret D. Stetz and Cheryl A. Wilson, Michael Field and Their World (London: Riverdale Press, 2007)

Sight and Song criticizes Victorian ideological views of sex, gender and aesthetics. One of the poems, La Gioconda, was inspired not only by Leonardo Da Vinci’s painting, but also by Walter Pater’s essay in The Renaissance. Throughout history, women have been represented in art as being sexually passive, indifferent, and receptive.@Kathy Alexis Psomiades. "Beauty's Body: Gender Ideology and British Aestheticism". Victorian Studies 36.1 (1992): 37. Web. In the Victorian period, women were portrayed as the damsel in distress. They would objectify them by assigning them a value and ignoring the fact that they are complex human beings. The Mona Lisa, a painting kept behind bulletproof glass that is there to be looked upon, is arguably a reflection of that objectification of women. Field’s La Gioconda is a critique on masculine representations of women. It acknowledges the problem of the woman who is consumed by the interests of male aestheticism and resists this commoditization.@Jill Ehnenn. Looking Strategically: Feminist and Queer Aesthetics in Michael Field's Sight and Song. Victorian Poetry, Vol. 43, 2005 In Field’s La Gioconda, Mona Lisa is not merely a passive receiver of a gaze; she is the observer. In notes from the diaries of Michael Field, they write that her eyes, smile, lips, and hands "all are infamously, perfectly treacherous to the point of infatuation—& to the measure of universality. It is no portrait, it is a dream of power and occult influence."@Margaret D. Stetz and Cheryl A. Wilson, Michael Field and Their World (London: Riverdale Press, 2007)

Field’s poem begins by describing the painting in detail with special attention given to her eyes, lips, and hands. As the poem progresses, it becomes apparent that the Fields viewed the Mona Lisa as a predator, waiting patiently for her prey (the spectator) so that she can consume them. The poem presents the view of the visual in terms of both object and subject. It gives the Mona Lisa sexual power and rejects commonly held notions of women as submissive. This is their way of subverting the hegemonic gender roles that they’ve been assigned by virtue of being women in the Victorian period and steering away from that.@Ruth Vanita, Sappho and the Virgin Mary: Same Sex Love and the English Literary Imagination (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996) The Fields had a profound influence on the early feminist movement. The themes of feminine power, seduction and mystery were prevalent in their works. At the time of the publication of Sights and Song in 1892, Field’s dual female identity was not widely known. By writing from a presumed male’s point of view, they were able to portray women from a more pragmatic point of view and advocate for women.