Pelona

Pelona of 1904, in the MNAC, is identified by its title with a Spanish nickname or personal name rather than a descriptive category, suggesting a specific individual within the Roma community of El Raval whom Nonell knew well enough to identify by name. The specificity of the name distinguishes this painting from those in the series titled only by category — Gypsy Woman, Young Gypsy Woman — and suggests an ongoing relationship between the artist and his subjects rather than a distance of sociological observation. Nonell's Roma portraits were controversial in Barcelona partly because they refused to engage the Roma community as either threat or entertainment, insisting instead on the individuality and human weight of specific people whose poverty was a social fact rather than a character trait.

The individual title's specificity finds its formal complement in a slightly more differentiated physiognomic study than some of Nonell's more generic Roma figures. The face's particular features are rendered with care, the paint working to establish specific character rather than type. The dark surrounding tones remain consistent with the series' overall chromatic approach.