Keywords: Goya Portrait- Forgery.JPG Base painting 1790s Over painting unknown but thought to be from the late 19th century Oil canvas cm 62 23 48 26 Fogg Art Museum object history 1943 Bequest of Grenville L Winthrop credit line This portrait of Maria Isabella de Bourbon infanta of Spain 1741-1763 thought to be painted by Goya was bequeathed to the Fogg Art Museum in 1943 Although the canvas was old and the paint bore the crackle marks of age several scholars came to doubt the painting �s authenticity In 1954 X-ray images were taken of the painting and conservators were surprised to find an earlier portrait of a different woman beneath the surface X-ray diffraction analysis revealed the presence of zinc white paint which was invented after Goya's death Thorough cleaning of the painting confirmed that the surface paint was relatively modern and had been applied so as not to obscure the craquelure of the original Curators also discovered extensive damage to the base portrait; leading some to speculate that the forger attempted to scrape off the earlier face Upon completing the analysis the conservators left the work as you see it above with portions of the original painting visable on the left and the newer forgery on the right to illustrate the intricacies of art forgery and the inherent difficulty of detecting it It is thought that the base painting is a provincial Spanish work dating to the 1790s http //www harvardmagazine com/on-line/090432 html accession number http //www artmuseums harvard edu/collections/servlet/webpublisher WebCommunication ia codetail ic basic oid 85125 sq 5 tr 129 tech name goya title objtype medspt dtfrom dtto century credit cult accnum pic aid 1514 icurrpage 1 isrc singleartist Harvard University Works after Francisco de Goya 18th-century oil on canvas paintings Oil portraits of women Art forgery PD-old-100 |