Figure féminine (Sibylle à la tabula rasa)

This small canvas is one of the puzzles of Velazquez's later years, and nobody knows who the woman is. She is usually called a sibyl, an ancient prophetess, because she echoes an earlier figure he painted holding a tablet. Here she turns in profile, a finger resting on a slate that has nothing written on it at all, a tabula rasa, a blank slate. Her hair is loose, strands falling on her bare neck, her lips just parted as if she is about to speak. The painting was probably never finished, which may be why it feels so alive and unguarded, brushed quickly in pearly whites. It was made around 1648, when Velazquez was court painter to Philip IV in Madrid.