Slave for Sale

Una esclava en venta is a painting by José Jiménez Aranda.

It is also one of the most interesting nude painings showing women of Spanish painting of the 19th century.

Aranda painted few pictures of nude women, and few with an orientalist theme.

The painting shows the taste for the exotic and oriental, yet it keeps with the ideals of Romanticism.

It shows an almost cinematographic setting, a prostrate young woman surrounded by the feet of her possible buyers.

There also is a high contrast between the vividly-colored carpet and the pale skin of the slave, who is shown with great dignity.