The Nude Maja
Direct eye contact was not the scandal here. Titian’s Venus of Urbino had done that 250 years earlier, and Goya knew it. The break was something else: this is the first known painting in Western art to show a woman’s pubic hair, with no mythological cover and no gesture of modesty. For the Inquisition that was enough.
Quick Facts
- Artist: Francisco Goya (1746–1828)
- Spanish title: La maja desnuda
- Date: c. 1797–1800
- Medium: Oil on canvas
- Dimensions: 98 × 191 cm
- Movement: Romanticism
- Location: Museo del Prado, Madrid
What is a maja?
Worth explaining, because the title is usually left untranslated and the word carries the meaning.
Majos and majas were working-class Madrileños of the late eighteenth century who developed a distinctive style: particular dress, particular slang, a swaggering manner.
The aristocracy took to imitating them — a fashion known as majismo. Duchesses dressed as majas; noblemen dressed as majos.
So the title says something specific: this woman is not a goddess and not a noblewoman. She is a girl from the city. That is part of the provocation.
What makes it unforgettable?
In Western painting the nude needed an alibi. Venus, Diana, a nymph, an allegory of Truth — mythology was the permit.
Goya provided none. There are no attributes, no symbols, no title pointing anywhere. There is a woman on a divan in a Madrid room.
And there is the detail that settled the matter. European nudes had consistently omitted body hair; the nude was smoothed and made abstract. Goya painted it. This is the first known instance in Western art.
The gaze, however, was not new. Venus of Urbino, painted by Titian in 1534, has the same pose and the same look out of the canvas. Goya was quoting it deliberately — and stripping out the mythology.
Two majas and a mechanism
One of the better details in the painting’s history.
Goya made a pair: the nude, and La maja vestida — the same woman, the same pose, dressed as a maja. The clothed version came several years later, probably around 1800–1805.
Both belonged to Manuel Godoy, chief minister to Charles IV and the queen’s favourite, who kept them in a private cabinet of nudes.
According to the inventory, the two canvases were mounted in a device: the clothed maja hung in front, and a mechanism drew it aside to reveal the nude behind. A visitor saw what the host chose to show.
The same cabinet held Velázquez’s Rokeby Venus, the only surviving nude by that painter.
The Inquisition
In 1808 Godoy fell along with the whole regime, and his collection was confiscated.
In 1815 Goya was summoned before the Inquisition and required to answer three questions: whether he was the author of the paintings, who had commissioned them, and for what purpose.
He was sixty-nine, deaf, and had only recently emerged from proceedings examining his own conduct under the French occupation.
The record of his testimony does not survive. We do not know what he said, whom he named, or how the case concluded. What is known is that he suffered no penalty.
Both paintings went into the stores of the Academy of San Fernando and were not exhibited for decades. They reached the Prado only in 1901.
Who was the model?
Unanswerable, but the candidates are worth knowing.
Cayetana, Duchess of Alba. The most popular theory, based on her close association with Goya. In 1945 her descendants permitted an exhumation to compare skeletal proportions; the remains were too degraded to establish anything.
Pepita Tudó. Godoy’s mistress, whom he later married. This version has the advantage that the paintings hung in his private rooms.
A composite figure. Some scholars note that the head appears out of proportion with the body and set at an awkward angle, as though painted separately. The body may belong to one model and the face to another, or to none.
What to look for
The gaze. Direct, steady, without coquetry. This woman is not surprised.
The arms. Folded behind the head — an open, confident posture, the opposite of the modesty gesture that governed classical nudes.
The head. Look at where the neck meets the body. The proportions do not agree and the angle is unnatural. This is the evidence behind the composite theory.
Skin against fabric. The body is painted smoothly, almost porcelain-like; the pillows and lace are broad and rough, with visible texture. The contrast is deliberate.
The green of the divan. Dark velvet that intensifies the pallor of the figure. It usually vanishes in reproduction.
Compare with the clothed version. They hang side by side. The clothed maja is painted faster, with a broader brush and far greater freedom — many scholars consider it the better painting.
About Francisco Goya
Born in 1746 in Fuendetodos, Aragon, the son of a gilder. He trained in Zaragoza and Madrid and travelled to Italy.
He became a royal painter in 1786 and First Court Painter in 1799 — the highest position available to an artist in Spain.
A severe illness in 1793 left him permanently deaf. From that point his output divided: official portraits in public, and privately the Caprichos, the Disasters of War, and eventually the Black Paintings.
He left for France in 1824 and died in Bordeaux four years later.
Legacy and influence
The most important descendant is Olympia by Manet, painted in 1863. The same pose, the same gaze, the same refusal of mythology — and an identical scandal sixty years later.
There is a further episode that rarely gets told. In 1930 Spain issued a set of postage stamps reproducing The Nude Maja. The United States Post Office refused to deliver mail bearing them, on grounds of indecency. The painting was still causing offence 130 years after it was made.
Today it functions as a reference point in arguments about who may depict the female body, and on what terms.
Where to see it today
The painting hangs in the Museo del Prado in Madrid, beside La maja vestida.
- The Prado opens on Mondays as well: Monday to Saturday 10–20, Sundays and holidays 10–19. Hours change periodically.
- Admission is free for the last two hours; those places cannot be booked and the queue forms in advance.
- See both majas together. They were made as a pair, and only the comparison shows what was at stake — including the striking difference in handling.
- Look at the join between head and neck. It is the most-discussed passage in the painting.
- Also here: The Third of May 1808, Saturn Devouring His Son, and Velázquez’s Las Meninas.
Frequently asked questions
What does maja mean?
A working-class woman of Madrid, recognisable by her dress and manner. In the late eighteenth century imitating majas became a fashion among the aristocracy.
Why was the painting scandalous?
Because it showed a real nude woman without mythological justification, and because it was the first known Western painting to depict pubic hair. Goya was summoned before the Inquisition in 1815.
Who was the model?
Unknown. The Duchess of Alba and Pepita Tudó, Godoy’s mistress, are the usual candidates. Some scholars argue the head was painted separately and the body belongs to a different sitter.
How does it differ from the clothed version?
Only in clothing — pose and composition are identical. The two were painted several years apart and were mounted in a device allowing the clothed version to conceal the nude.
What happened to Goya after the interrogation?
Nothing is known in detail; the record of his testimony has not survived. He suffered no penalty. Both paintings went into storage at the Academy of San Fernando and were only publicly displayed after transferring to the Prado in 1901.
Is it the first nude to look at the viewer?
No. Titian’s Venus of Urbino of 1534 has the same pose and the same gaze, and Goya was quoting it deliberately. What was new was the removal of mythology and the refusal to idealise the body.
If this painting has caught your interest, look next at Olympia by Manet — painted sixty years later and causing exactly the same scandal for exactly the same reasons, in front of a Salon jury rather than an inquisitorial tribunal.
Image: La maja desnuda – Francisco Goya (c. 1797–1800). License: Public Domain. Source: Wikimedia Commons.
