Meet the Lady from Lima in Wellesley

Wellesley College’s Davis Museum will unveil a recently acquired painting called “Lady from Lima” on Friday, April 26.

The museum says this “Portrait of a Young Woman,” nicknamed “Lady from Lima,” was painted in Peru during the 18th century and has never been publicly exhibited.

According to Davis Museum Adjunct Curator of Latin American Art and Senior Lecturer in the Wellesley College Art Department James Oles, “The work is not widely known now, but given its rarity, will certainly become an iconic example of Latin American colonial portraiture as it is included in future publications and exhibitions.”

In celebration of the first public exhibition of this portrait, a free afternoon symposium “A Lady from Lima: Culture, Collecting, Conservation,” will be held at the Davis on the 26th beginning at 2:30 pm. A team of experts will address many questions about the work: Who was the artist? Who was the patron? What can this work tell us about art and society in colonial Lima, one of the richest cities in the Spanish Empire?

The painting was acquired in 2011 with funds from the Wellesley College Friends of Art.