Catalan school, late 19th century. "Manola and Harlequin". Oil on canvas. Period frame. Size: 100 x 65 cm; 125 x 91 cm (frame). The European painting of the end of the 19th century knows the rise of symbolism and other avant-garde movements that often denote a special fascination for the disguise and the concealment, as well as for the circus world. In fact, clowns and harlequins are metaphorical figures, allegories of the figure of the artist, with which he reflects on his marginality and rootlessness, but also on his freedom and irreverence. The painting we are dealing with here can be placed in that historical moment, an extremely fertile time for creation. We see a harlequin in a white suit with large buttons and a pleated ruff. His defiant, sardonic gaze leads us to suspect that he may be the artist himself in disguise. Next to him poses a young woman who also hides behind a folkloric mask: a black mantilla that partially conceals her identity. The painting is executed in a figurative language of Post-Impressionist technique, with loose, agile brushstrokes.