On the morning of 18 September 2026, a Cessna R182 Skylane RG took off from Bentonville Municipal Airport in northwest Arkansas and spent the next few hours flying what looked, at first, like a random scribble of turns on the flight tracking maps12. By late morning the line had closed into a portrait of the Mona Lisa, about 56 kilometres (35 miles) tall, laid across the state line between Oklahoma and Arkansas2.

The pilot is Benjamin McDaniel, who posts his flight path art under the name The Pilot Picasso34. The FAA aircraft registry lists N1810R as a 1978 Cessna R182 registered to him5. AirNav Radar wrote about the drawing while it was still being flown, as the arms were being added6, News 9 in Oklahoma reported it the same evening1, and CBS reported that the portrait took months of planning7.

What the ADS-B data shows

Open ADS-B data from adsb.lol shows N1810R leaving Bentonville at about 08:08 local time and landing back there at about 11:55, a flight of 3 hours and 47 minutes2. After a transit of roughly a quarter of an hour to the west, the aircraft spent more than three hours on the drawing itself. The finished figure measures about 56 kilometres from the top of the head to the hands and about 42 kilometres across2. Most of it lies in Oklahoma, east of Tahlequah, with the right-hand side of the figure, shoulder and arm, reaching into Arkansas around Siloam Springs2.

In total the aircraft covered roughly 780 kilometres (about 420 nautical miles), around 670 of them on the portrait2. During the drawing it flew mostly between 8,200 and 10,400 feet, rising from about 8,200 feet early in the drawing to a peak of around 10,400 feet towards 10:45, at typical groundspeeds of 95 to 125 knots2. The transponder showed code 1200, the standard code for VFR flight, from take-off to landing2. Reported flight times in the media range from about three and a half to five hours18; the 3 hours and 47 minutes in the ADS-B data run from take-off to landing.

Who is The Pilot Picasso

McDaniel graduated from Auburn University in Alabama in 2022 with a degree in aviation management, earned his instrument rating there and holds a commercial pilot certificate, a seaplane rating and a flight instructor certificate8. He instructed at Auburn and at a flight school in Alabaster, Alabama, and now flies for private and charter clients from Bentonville8. He bought his Cessna 182 in 20238, the year the FAA issued the current registration for N1810R5.

On his own site he writes that he has been flying since 2020 and that sky art began as a way to build hours and stay sharp: first simple shapes and words, then more ambitious drawings, all flown by hand in N1810R3. In early August he flew The One Ring and the Eye of Sauron from The Lord of the Rings in four and a half hours, about 30 miles wide, in the skies over Arkansas8.

Why he does it

"The art came about as a way to help hone my skills and keep on practicing by doing something a little different than flying airport to airport," McDaniel told Auburn University8. He hand flies the drawings rather than following GPS waypoints: "I hand fly it because it's a great way to keep up, as we call it, stick and rudder skills"8. Asked on local television why he does it, he answered: "For the challenge but also for the greater good," adding that he wants to show people messages that they might need that day9.

How you plan a flight like this

A drawing like this starts on the ground. McDaniel plans headings, speeds and aircraft performance in advance, and he sizes each design so the Cessna can fly every turn safely, usually at 8,000 to 10,000 feet8. In its article on the flight, Brookfield Aviation lists the other limits that shape a route like this: the shape of every turn, how long the aircraft can stay up, fuel, weather and airspace, all for an image the pilot cannot see from the cockpit10.

The aircraft cannot lift the pen, so the whole portrait is one continuous line. Every move from the eyes to the mouth or from the hair to the hands has to be flown, which is why some lines in the track run close together or double back on each other2. What the map shows is the track over the ground, not the heading, so any wind has to be corrected turn by turn to keep a curve where it belongs. That is the same wind correction every student pilot learns on a cross-country flight, only with far less room for error.

Fuel planning follows the normal rules. For a day VFR flight in the United States, a pilot must be able to reach the first point of intended landing and then fly for at least 30 more minutes at normal cruising speed11. On a sortie of almost four hours, that reserve has to be planned from the start, not found at the end.

Sky art and building hours

Drawing with a flight path is not new. In August 2017, a Boeing test crew flew a 787 Dreamliner for 18 hours over 22 US states during an engine test and traced the outline of a Dreamliner on the map12. What has changed is the audience. According to Auburn, about 73,000 people followed the Mona Lisa flight online and N1810R was the most tracked aircraft in the air that day8.

For aspiring pilots, the story is also about hours. A US commercial pilot certificate requires at least 250 hours of flight time13, and many pilots build a large part of those hours after their private licence. McDaniel turned that phase into a project that sharpens exactly the skills examiners look for: planning, holding a heading and altitude, and knowing where you are at every moment. If you are working towards a commercial licence, read what a CPL is and how the PPL works, see how to prepare to become a flight instructor, or look at the Auburn University aviation programme where McDaniel trained.

Frequently asked questions

Who drew the Mona Lisa with a flight path?

Benjamin McDaniel, a commercial pilot and flight instructor based in Bentonville, Arkansas, who posts his work as The Pilot Picasso38.

Which aircraft did he fly?

His own Cessna R182 Skylane RG, registration N1810R, built in 197856.

How big was the drawing and how long did it take?

About 56 kilometres tall and 42 kilometres wide, flown in a flight of 3 hours and 47 minutes from take-off to landing, according to ADS-B data2.