- Cronología
- 1800 - 1801
- Ubicación
- The Uffizi Gallery, Florence, Italy
- Dimensiones
- 198 x 115,5 cm
- Técnica y soporte
- Oil on canvas
- Reconocimiento de la autoría de Goya
- Undisputed work
- Titular
- Istituti Museali della Soprintendenza Speciale per il Polo Museale Fiorentino
- Ficha: realización/revisión
- 20 Jan 2010 / 14 Apr 2021
This work was in the family residence of the Palace of Boadilla del Monte (Madrid). It came into the possession of the Duke of Sueca and was inherited by Prince Francesco Ruspoli di Cerveteri, in whose collection it was documented in 1904. It entered the Uffizi Gallery in 1972.
Goya painted María Teresa de Bourbon y Vallabriga on several occasions during his stays at Arenas de San Pedro (Ávila). The first time was when she was four years old, then came the group portrait of the family , and later by herself with the Gredos mountains in the background (María Teresa de Borbón) and again in the painting in which Goya painted her seated and which now belongs to the Prado Museum. This last work bears an especially close formal resemblance to the one analysed here.
This full-length portrait depicts the fifteenth Countess of Chinchón standing in front of a dark, neutral background. Her body is turned slightly to one side and she holds a fan in her hands, one of which is resting on top of the other. She is wearing a long airy white dress, with pinkish coloured sheer layers, low-cut and with short sleeves. Her curly hair is gathered up into a headdress with feathers and a blue bow, which hangs down behind her head. The only signs of her social standing are the discretely worn sash and starry cross of the Order of María Luisa, which she was awarded in 1800, along with some jewellery (bracelet, necklace and earrings).
The subject is gazing coyly out at the viewer, with a shy smile on her lips, her posture emphasizing the official nature of the portrait. The portrait is remarkable for the tenderness and subtlety of its execution, both in the psychological insight achieved by the artist and in his treatment of the textures of the clothing.
For more biographical information, see María Teresa de Borbón y Vallabriga.
The restoration work done for the Goya e Italia exhibition, in Zaragoza, provided an opportunity to eliminate some previous retouching work that was affecting the background on the right-hand side. An x-ray of the painting revealed, in the lower part of the figure, a sketch of one or two heads which, according to Joan Sureda, are similar in appearance to the caricatured faces of Goya’s Caprices.
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Goya. La década de Los CaprichosMadrid1992organized by Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando sponsored by Fundación Central Hispano, Madrid, consultant editor Nigel Glendinnig. From October 26th 1992 to January 10th 1993cat. 10
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Il Gran Teatro del Mondo. L’Anime e il Volto del SettecentoPalazzo RealeMilan2003From November 13th 2003 to March 28th 2004
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Goya e ItaliaMuseo de ZaragozaZaragoza2008organized by the Fundación Goya en Aragóna, consultant editor Joan Sureda Pons. From June 1st to September 15th 2008cat. 273
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Goya y el infante don Luis: el exilio y el reino.Palacio Real, MadridMadrid2012Arte y ciencia en la época de la ilustración española. Responsable científico Francisco Calvo Serraller. Del octubre de 2012 a enero de 2013.cat. 22
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Goya: Order and disorderMuseum of Fine Arts2014
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vol. I, p. 118
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L’opera pittorica completa di GoyaMilanRizzoli1974p.113 (il.) y p.114, cat. 369
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Goya e Italia, 2 vols.ZaragozaFundación Goya en Aragón y Turner2008vol. I, p. 195 (il.), vol II, cat. 273,