Turkish Women in the Countryside near Istanbul

A group of women have gone out into the countryside near Istanbul, and all of them are looking up. Above them floats a vague female figure, hazy and half transparent.

At first sight it looks like an earlier layer of paint showing through, a figure the painter changed his mind about and covered. The Rijksmuseum says the apparition is intentional. What story it tells is not known. It might come from a Turkish folk tale, or the women may be seeing visions after smoking opium, and the museum leaves both possibilities open.