Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes
, Spanish, 1746-1828
Title
Portrait of a Lady in a Black MantillaDatec.1824
MediumOil on canvas
Dimensions
54 x 43 cm
Credit LinePurchased, 1905
Object numberNGI.572
Exhibition HistorySpanish Old Masters, Grafton Galleries, October 1913 - January 1914
Goya Exhibition, Bordeaux; Padro, Madrid, 1951
Retrospective Goya, Musée Jacquemart-André, Paris, 1961-1962
Goya and his Times, Royal Academy, Burlington House, London, 1963-1964
Centenary Exhibition, National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin, October - December 1964
From Titian to Delacroix: Masterpieces from the National Gallery of Ireland, Yokohama Sogo Museum of Art, 25 August 1993 - 17 October 1993; Chiba Sogo Museum of Art, 10 November 1993 - 20 December 1993; Prefectural Museum of Art, Yamaguchi, 5 January 1994 - 20 February 1994; Kobe City Museum, 25 February 1994 - 10 April 1994; Isetan Museum of Art, 14 April 1994 - 24 May 1994
European Masterpieces from the National Gallery of Ireland, National Gallery, Canberra, 25 June 1994 - 3 October 1994; Art Gallery of New South Wales, 21 October 1994 - 15 January 1995
Hommage a Goya, Musée des Beaux-Arts de Bordeux, 6 March - 6 May 1998; Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, 14 May - 14 July 1998
Terror and Sublime: Art and Politics in an Age of Anxiety, Crawford Art Gallery, Cork, 20 November 2009 - 27 February 2010
Goya’s Experience, Palais des Beaux-Arts de Lille, France, 15 October 2021 – 14 February 2022
Label TextThe intimacy of the woman’s expression has led to speculation that she is Goya’s mistress Leocadia Weiss, or Catalina Moreno, mistress of the Marqués de San Adrían. No definite likeness of either has been found for comparison. As in other portraits painted by Goya around 1824, the details such as the black lace mantilla, earring, and comb are painted with freedom. The skin tones, painted in green, grey and white, are also characteristic of the artist’s work in this period, when he left Madrid for Bordeaux to escape the tyrannical rule of Ferdinand VII.