Lecture: Dressing Queen Mariana of Austria

January 25, 2025
Amanda Wunder, Professor of History and Art History, City University of New York (Lehman College and the Graduate Center)

Mariana of Austria wears a stunning black-and-silver dress in Velázquez’s iconic portrait. Did dresses like this really exist? If so, how were they made? And what was it like to wear them? In this lecture, the author of Spanish Fashion in the Age of Velázquez explores the materials and techniques that went into making courtly dresses in 17th-century Spain and reveals the hidden undergarments that created the queen’s unnatural silhouette. Lifting the curtain from the portrait, Amanda Wunder introduces the skilled court artisans who worked behind the scenes to dress the Spanish queen and brings to life the flesh-and-blood woman who lived behind the masklike makeup and heavy wig in Velázquez’s famous painting.

Presented in conjunction with the exhibition, Mariana: Velázquez’s Portrait of a Queen from the Museo Nacional del Prado, on view December 13, 2024 through March 24, 2025.