Explore the Description of this artwork.
The painting depicts two well-dressed women – "majas", beautiful young Spanish wives in elaborate clothing including lace mantillas – sitting behind the balustrade of a balcony, with two men standing inconspicuously in the shadows behind. Earlier interpretations of this painting unfortunately misunderstood the painting, believing the two women to be courtesans. Instead, we now know that they are the wives of the nobleman who are fishing on the lagoon. This painting is the companion painting to Carpaccio’s late 15th century “Hunting on the Lagoon" in the Getty collection.
There is a strong contrast between the light colours of the women and their richly decorated clothing in the foreground, and the plain heavy clothing of the men lurking in the background whose dark hats and cloaks conceal their features.  The painting has a strict geometric composition, with the top of the balustrade dividing the scene into two regions.  The top of the balustrade also forms the diagonal of a square from which the position of the figures is measured: the pilasters of the balustrade are in the lower half of the square, and the women lean towards each other in a triangle formed from the top half of the square.  The composition of the area above the balustrade falls into four equal quadrants of another square.
mantilla majas