ZACARÍAS GONZÁLEZ VELÁZQUEZ | PORTRAIT OF A YOUNG WOMAN, HALF-LENGTH, HOLDING A FAN

Dominguez collection (according to a label on the frame);

Joseph Duveen, 1st Baron Duveen (1869–1939);

By whom gifted as a wedding present to his daughter The Hon. Dorothy Burns (1903–85);

With Ana Chiclana, 2017 (when exhibited at Paris Tableau Brussels).

"This beautiful portrait is a celebration of Spanish culture, painted at a time when it was under threat from France through the widespread importation of French fashion, art and customs. The sitter proudly wears the national dress which was widely worn from common girls to the Duchess of Alba."

James Macdonald

Zacarías González Velázquez was chamber painter and member of the Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando in Madrid, where he became director of painting and general manager. He began his training in the studio of Mariano Salvador Maella and at the Academia de Bellas Artes – directed by his father, the painter Antonio González Velázquez – where he won prizes in 1778 and 1781. The present young woman is wearing the most typical Spanish costume, consisting of a basquiña skirt and a shawl, garments that together with a fan and cap were sine qua non items in the dowry of any Spanish woman, regardless of social status. This style of dress, highly praised by foreign travellers, was far removed from the international dictates of fashion issuing from France. These clothes, whose origin lay with the humbler classes in Madrid, were used as casual dress for wearing on a stroll or simply going out on errands.