Plate 15 from 'Los Caprichos': Pretty Advice (Bellos consejos)

Goya (Francisco de Goya y Lucientes)

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Two of Goya’s most instantly recognizable types appear in this scene, in which a young maja, her eyes downcast, holds an open fan and attentively listens to an elderly, veiled woman, probably a bawd, or madam. The details make clear that the elder is instructing her junior how to attract attention or entice a wealthy suitor. Nineteenth-century writers referred to the questionable nature of the bawd’s teachings and proposed that the two might be mother and daughter, suggesting that Goya was criticizing mercenary women for corrupting their own children. Goya’s working methods are revealed in this proof impression, as he retouched the print with ink around the younger woman’s eyes before reworking the copperplate.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Department’s vast collection of works on paper comprises approximately 21,000 drawings, 1.2 million prints, and 12,000 illustrated books created in Europe and the Americas from about 1400 to the present day. Since its foundation in 1916, the Department has been committed to collecting a wide range of works on paper, which includes both pieces that are incredibly rare and lauded for their aesthetic appeal, as well as material that is more popular, functional, and ephemeral. The broad scope of the department’s collecting encourages questions of connoisseurship as well as those pertaining to function and context, and demonstrates the vital role that prints, drawings, and illustrated books have played throughout history.

Metropolitan Museum of Art