María Ramona de Barbachano

Goya painted this young Basque woman around 1787, just as his career was taking off and he was moving into the circle of the Spanish court. She is Maria Ramona de Barbachano, married that same year to Antonio Adan de Yarza, a landowner from Biscay. Goya portrayed the husband and his mother as well, most likely to mark the new match. The three pictures then went home with the family to their manor, the Zubieta palace on the northern coast, and simply stayed there, out of public view, for generations. When the Spanish Civil War broke out the Basque government moved them to Paris for safekeeping, and they dropped from sight for decades. Only in 2019 did the museum in Bilbao show all three portraits together for the first time.