An Old Woman Cooking Eggs

Diego Velázquez executed this bodegón (kitchen scene) around 1618, when he was just eighteen or nineteen years old and still living in Seville. An old woman sits holding a spoon over eggs frying in a terracotta pot while a young boy watches, holding a flask of wine and a melon. Their actions are frozen; they don't interact or meet each other's gaze.

The realism Velázquez achieved here was unprecedented in Spanish painting. Critics dismissed still-life paintings as the lowest genre, but Velázquez reportedly said, "I would rather be the first painter of common things than second in higher art." The tour de force is the eggs congealing in oil, alongside gleaming brass, glazed earthenware, and the wooden table's grain.

The painting measures about 100 by 120 centimeters. After passing through British collectors in the 19th century, the Scottish National Gallery acquired it in 1955 with help from the Art Fund. It's now recognized as one of the finest examples of Spanish bodegón painting.