It shows two women with maniacal smiles seemingly laughing at a simple-minded man who appears to be masturbating at the right hand of the picture.

Despite their jeers, the woman to the left may also be masturbating, which——in the absence of any written or oral comment from Goya on any work in the series—art critics and historians believe lends to the image's futile and sterile intent.

The work shows three figures, generally thought to be two witch-like women and one man, huddled together against a black background and lit from the front left.

According to Licht, "there may be an element of self-mockery in this painting, some equation between the ironic loneliness of the exhibitionist (whose aim of attracting people is constantly thwarted by the means he obsessively adopts to capture attention) and the artist who also bares himself without shame or restraint and who is also doomed to being railed at as an aberration.

They are all predominantly dark; Goya began each with a thick overlay of black paint on top of which he etched the figures with lighter shades of whites, grays, blues and green.

[7] According to the c. 1828–1830 inventory of Goya's friend, Antonio Brugada, Women Laughing was situated opposite Men Reading on the smaller walls of the upper floor of the Quinta.