◧ Artist: Francisco Goya (1746 - 1828)
◧ Country: Spain
◧ Title: [The Love Letter] or [Young Woman with a Letter]
◧ Medium: Oil painting on canvas
◧ Painting Size: 181 x 125 cm
◧ Title: [The Love Letter] or [Young Woman with a Letter]
◧ Medium: Oil painting on canvas
◧ Painting Size: 181 x 125 cm
◧ Museum: Palais des Beaux-Arts de Lille (Lille Palace of Fine Arts), France
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◧ Country of Stamp Issue: France◧ Date of Issue: March 7, 1981
◧ Face Value: 1.40 + 0.30 French Franc
◧ Issued as a semi-postal issue
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A beautiful, young lady is walking. She is sheltered from the sun by a parasol held by her servant. This maja - an elegantly dressed Spanish woman - is reading a letter. A shopping list? Of course not ! A love letter, no doubt. But looking at her attitude - she smiles, her fist on her hip - we can imagine that she is laughing at what her lover wrote to her!
The couple that this arrogant young woman forms with her dog is treated with great precision. His maid is in the shadows. Now look at the background of the painting. A group of women - washerwomen - are busy working. They are hunched over and wear out washing clothes in the river. Goya brushes them in broad strokes. You can't make out their faces. Is this a way of showing that at the time these women belonged to the bottom of the social ladder? The difference in treatment between the characters suggests so. (painting description from Palais des Beaux-Arts de Lille)
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