Doña Barbara Maria de Hueva was born at Madrid in 1733. Before she had
reached her twentieth year, according to Bermudez, she had acquired so
much skill in painting, that at the first meeting of the Academy of St.
Ferdinand in 1752, on the exhibition of some of her sketches, she was
immediately elected an honorary academician, and received the first
diploma issued under the royal charter. "This proud distinction," said
the president, "is conferred in the hope that the fair artist may be
encouraged to rival the fame of those ladies already illustrious in
art." How far this hope was realized, Bermudez has omitted to inform us.