- La maja desnuda
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La maja desnuda 
Artist Francisco Goya Year circa 1797–1800 Type Oil on canvas Dimensions 97 cm × 190 cm (38 in × 75 in) Location Museo del Prado, Madrid La maja desnuda (known in English as The Naked (or Nude) Maja) is an oil on canvas painting by the Spanish painter Francisco Goya (1746–1828), portraying a nude woman reclining on a bed of pillows. It was executed some time between 1797 and 1800, and is sometimes said to be the first clear depiction of female pubic hair in a large Western painting.[1] The painting has been in the Museo del Prado in Madrid since 1910.
Contents
History
La maja vestida, ca. 1803.
Goya created another painting of the same woman identically posed, but clothed, entitled La maja vestida (The Clothed Maja); also in the Prado, it is usually hung next to La maja desnuda. The identity of the model and why the paintings were created are still unknown. Both paintings were first recorded as belonging to the collection of Prime Minister Manuel de Godoy, Duke of Alcudia, and it has been conjectured that the woman depicted was his young mistress. It has also been suggested that the woman was María del Pilar Teresa Cayetana de Silva y Álvarez de Toledo, 13th Duchess of Alba, with whom Goya is rumored to have been romantically involved and did complete known portraits of. However, many scholars have rejected this possibility, including Australian art critic Robert Hughes in his 2003 biography, Goya. Many agree that Pepita Tudó is a more likely candidate. Others believe the woman depicted is actually a composite of several different models.
View of the two paintings side by sideIn 1815, the Spanish Inquisition summoned Goya to reveal who commissioned him to create La maja desnuda.[2] If Goya gave an explanation of the painting's origin to the Inquisition, that account has never surfaced. Two sets of stamps depicting La maja desnuda in commemoration of Goya's work were privately produced in 1930, and later approved by the Spanish Postal Authority. That same year, the United States government barred and returned any mail bearing the stamps.[3]
Goya not only upset the ecclesiastical authorities, titillated the public, and extended the artistic horizon of the day. His work inspired other artists. Jeffrey Meyers, for example, in his book Impressionist Quartet: The Intimate Genius of Manet and Morisot, Degas and Cassatt, opines that Manet's Olympia "boldly alluded to another masterpiece, Goya's Naked Maja."[4]see also
Notes
- ^ Others had certainly hinted at it before, however; Lucas Cranach the Elder's painting The Nymph of the Spring from around 1539 seems to show pubic hair, and his Water Nymph Resting clearly depicts it as well.
- ^ National Gallery of Art. Goya: images of women 2002 p. 228
- ^ http://www.artonstamps.org/goya.htm
- ^ Jeffrey Meyers, Impressionist Quartet: The Intimate Genius of Manet and Morisot, Degas and Cassatt. New York: Harcourt, 2005. p. 35.
References
- http://www.abcgallery.com/G/goya/goyabio.html
- http://www.newyorker.com/printables/critics/031103crbo_books1
- http://www.marxist.com/ArtAndLiterature/goya_1.html
External links
Francisco Goya Paintings Blind Guitarist (1778) • Christ Crucified (1780) • Maria Teresa de Borbon y Vallabriga (1783) • Spring (or The Flower Girls) (1786–1787) • The Swing (1787) • St Francis Borja at the Deathbed of an Impenitent (1788) • Manuel Osorio de Zuniga (c. 1788) • Witches' Sabbath (1789) • Self-portrait (c. 1790–1795) • Little Giants (1791–1792) • Portrait of Mariana Waldstein (c. 1792) • Strolling Players (1793) • Yard with Lunatics (1793–1794) • Marquesa de la Solana (c. 1794–1795) • Duchess of Alba (1797) • Self-Portrait with Eyeglasses (1797) • The Bewitched Man (1797-1798) • The Devil's Lamp (1797-1798) • Witches' Flight (1797-98) • Charles IV in his Hunting Clothes (1799) • Countess of Chinchon (1800) • La maja desnuda • Charles IV of Spain and His Family (1800–1801) • La maja vestida • Bartolome Sureda y Miserol (c. 1803–1804) • Portrait of Doña Isabel de Porcel (1804–1805) • Portrait of Francisca Sabasa García (1804-1808) • Doña Teresa Sureda (c. 1805) • The Colossus (1808–1812; attribution debated) • Majas on a Balcony (c. 1808–1812) • Time (c. 1810–1812) • Prison Interior (c. 1810–1814) • The Second of May 1808 (1814) • The Third of May 1808 (1814) • The Junta of the Philippines (1815) • The Madhouse (1812-1819) • The Inquisition Tribunal (1812-1819) • The Burial of the Sardine (c. 1816) • A Procession of Flagellants (c. 1816) • The Forge (c. 1817) • The Giant (1818) • Self-portrait with Dr Arrieta (1820) • The Milkmaid of Bordeaux (1825–1827)
Tapestry cartoonsThe Parasol (c. 1777) • Blind man's bluff (1789)Saturn Devouring His Son • Judith and Holofernes • Witches' Sabbath • A Pilgrimage to San Isidro • La Leocadia • Two Old Men • Men Reading • Man Mocked by Two Women • Fight with Cudgels • Procession of the Holy Office • Atropos • Asmodea • Two Old Men Eating Soup • The Dog
Etchings The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters (1797–1798) • What a sacrifice! (1797–1798) • They say yes and give their hand to the first comer (1797–1798) • Que se la llevaron! (1797–1798) • You who cannot (1797–1798)The Disasters of War
(Los desastres de la guerra)TauromaquiaUnfortunate events in the front seats of the ring of Madrid, and the death of the Mayor of Torrejón (1815–1816)Categories:- 1800 paintings
- Collections of the Museo del Prado
- Erotic art
- Francisco Goya paintings
- Romantic paintings
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