Maria Luisa of Parma, Queen of Spain

Experts working on another portrait of María Luisa found, under its surface, what must be the first study Goya made of her from life. A close-fitting dress, a big gauzy hat in the fashion of 1789, a dark mole on her temple. Goya painted over all of it himself around 1800, when those details had gone out of style, and kept the young face. Studies like that stayed in the workshop, and from them came versions such as this one, supplied to the institutions and private patrons who wanted the new queen on their walls. She stands life-size in a French court gown of blue tulle, lace and embroidery, a closed fan in her hand, the crown and ermine mantle on a table beside her. The Prado dates the canvas 1790 and catalogues it as a copy.