This painting by José Lerma is part of a series of works in which the artist excerpts historic paintings from the collection of the Art Institute of Chicago that feature subjects related to the Spanish diaspora. This particular piece is one excerpt of the painting La Madrileñita (1910), by the American painter Robert Henri (1865 - 1929). The title refers to a woman from Madrid. Lerma gives us a lush, spongy-looking, hyper-painterly depiction of the figure, defined by a bare minimum of massive, impasto brush strokes. Lerma’s pared down imagery, which crops the original composition and offers a bare bones simplification of its content, can be read as an elegantly stated critical response to the colonialist intent of the original painting. Henri was not Spanish, and only painted figures he encountered while passing through, offering an outsider’s rendition of what a patriarchal, white perspective on what a “Madrileñita” is or appears to be. Using common construction materials and household paint, Lerma’s painting scoffs at the finery associated with the original work. In its entirety, from its materials to its aesthetic composure, Lerma’s painting is a rough and barely recognizable translation of Henri’s painting, much as Henri’s painting is but a barely recognizable translation of the reality of the figure who originally sat for it.