The First Slap

The title has aged strangely. In the Greek of around 1908, when this was painted, a batsos was a slap across the face, and that is what the title promises, the first one. A Greek visitor today hears the same word as street slang for a policeman, a meaning it picked up only much later.

Ralli painted the minute after. The room is a village kitchen, a chair is over on the floor and the crockery is broken, and the rest is left to be read from the damage. Painters with Salon careers turned out small domestic subjects like this one for buyers who wanted a story they could follow at a glance, and this is about as small as they come, oil on canvas, 46 by 27 centimetres, dated by the National Gallery to roughly 1908 or 1909.