NARRATOR:
Little is known about Dona Francisca Vicenta Chollet y Caballero, the subject of this portrait by the 18th-century painter Francisco de Goya. A member of the Spanish nobility, she is depicted as if at an elegant ball or soirée, perhaps sitting out a dance on a stylish red sofa. In contrast to her rather ordinary looks, she wears a shimmering silk-embroidered gown, diamond necklace and jeweled tiara, rendered by the artist in sumptuous detail. Her absent-minded stare projects a feeling of melancholy or unease. Echoing her sullen expression is the little pug on her lap, whose fanciful collar and peevish glance add a comical note to this revealing portrait.
Goya is celebrated as a keen observer of humanity, whose pictures reflected the many historical upheavals of his time. In 1792, an illness left him deaf, and he became increasingly occupied with the imaginary worlds. He developed a bold new style that resembled caricature, and in 1799 published a series of etchings, known as Los Caprichos, that satirized human folly and weakness. The same year, he was appointed First Court Painter to the King of Spain, creating penetrating portraits like this one showing his sitters not as they wanted to be seen, but as Goya saw them.
Doña Francisca Vicenta Chollet y Caballero
1806
Francisco de Goya y Lucientes (Spanish, 1746-1828)
On View
In 1799, Francisco de Goya was made First Court Painter to King Charles IV of Spain. For the next ten years he painted numerous official portraits of the royal family, and many portraits of subjects of the court circle. In 1801, he painted Antonio Noriega de Bada y Bermúdez (National Gallery, Washington), the court treasurer and the husband of the sitter in this picture, who in that year was awarded the honorific membership in the Order of Carlos III. Five years later, the painter finished this portrait of Doña Francisca, in which he combines elements of delicate detail with great finesse—the embroidery of her silk dress, her sparkling tiara, and the dog’s outrageous collar—with an equally free, palpable brushwork. X-rays of portions of the composition, including her pose and the scampish pug, reveal final alterations made by Goya, causing some scholars to speculate that the portraits of husband and wife were originally intended as pendants. The ultimate simplicity of the composition and reduction of spatial depth give the subject a quiet and intimate character, despite her diffident aire.
Details
- Artist Name: Francisco de Goya y Lucientes (Spanish, 1746-1828)
- Title: Doña Francisca Vicenta Chollet y Caballero
- Date: 1806
- Medium: Oil on canvas
- Dimensions: overall: 40 1/2 in x 31 7/8 in
- Credit Line: Norton Simon Art Foundation
- Accession Number: M.1981.7.P
- Copyright: © Norton Simon Art Foundation
Object Information
Camille Groult, Paris, before January, 1908, by descent to his wife;
Madame Camille Groult, by descent ca. 1918 to;
Groult heirs until ca. 1925;
[Gimpel and Wildenstein, 1925];
Harrison Williams, New York, by 1928 until his death in 1953, by inheritance to his wife;
Countess Bismarck (formerly Mona Harrison Williams), New York (1899-1983) (sale, London, Christie’s, 10 July 1981, lot 122);
Norton Simon Art Foundation.
Madame Camille Groult, by descent ca. 1918 to;
Groult heirs until ca. 1925;
[Gimpel and Wildenstein, 1925];
Harrison Williams, New York, by 1928 until his death in 1953, by inheritance to his wife;
Countess Bismarck (formerly Mona Harrison Williams), New York (1899-1983) (sale, London, Christie’s, 10 July 1981, lot 122);
Norton Simon Art Foundation.
Spanish Paintings from El Greco to Goya
- The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1928 to
- Brettell, Richard R. and Stephen F. Eisenman, Nineteenth-Century Art in the Norton Simon Museum, volume 1,2006,
- Sanchez Cantón, Francisco Javier, Vida y obras de Goya,no. 100 p. 80
- Campbell, Sara, Collector Without Walls: Norton Simon and His Hunt for the Best,2010, cat. 1684 p. 435
- Gudiol, José, Goya 1746-1828: Biography, Analytical Study and Catalogue of His Paintings,vol. I., no. 524; vol. IV fig. 829
- Juliet Wilson-Bareau, Goya in the Norton Simon Museum,2016, cat. 3 pp. 7, 14, 153, 158, 160 (ill.), 161-62, 161 (x-radiograph), 254, 285, 289
- Gassier, Pierre; and Juliet Wilson, The Life and Complete Works of Francisco Goya with a Catalogue Raisonné of the Paintings, Drawings, and Engravings,no. 853 p. 200
- Angelis, R. de, L'opera pittorica completa di Goya,no. 450
- Beruete y Moret, A. de, Goya as Portrait Painter, p. 125
- Salas, Xavier de, Goya,no. 412
- Mayer, August L., Francisco de Goya,no. 216
- Masterpieces from the Norton Simon Museum,1989, p. 107
- Desparmet Fitzgerald, X., L'Oeuvre peint de Goya,no. 449
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