When studying history, one thing is clear: women were often pregnant. So why is it so rare to see pregnant women in paintings?

From a blog on Vermeer:

“There seem to be no depictions of pregnant women in the Dutch Republic of the seventeenth century. Pregnancy was obviously considered as indecorous and not attractive and was thus kept out of public eye as much as possible.”

Perhaps that was true throughout Europe. Here are a few I found:

One painting, presumed to be of a pregnant woman, is Woman in Blue Reading a Letter by Vermeer.

Another, sometimes suspected, The Mama Lisa:

Yep, I think that’s her secret. What do you think?