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| 1829 Portrait of Goya by Vicente López Portana oil 100 x 78 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
Francisco de Goya was a Spanish artist widely considered one of the most important painters of the Romantic period. The artist took on a wide array of subject matter, including self-portraiture, fantasy scenes, landscapes, and still lifes. “Painting, like poetry, selects in the universe whatever she deems most appropriate to her ends,” he once explained. Born Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes in the town of Fuendetodos, Spain on March 30, 1746, he began studying art under the painter Jose Luzán at the age of 14. During the 1770s, Goya produced works such as The Parasol (1777), which meld the unlikely pairing of cheery Rococo aesthetics with the moody works of Diego Velázquez.
The artist became the court painter of Charles III of Spain in 1786, and continued painting for the Spanish court until Napoleons invasion of Spain in 1808. During the Napoleonic wars, Goya’s palette significantly darkened as he produced some of his most famous works. Among these paintings are the The Second of May 1808 (1814) and The Third of May 1808 (1814), which show the terrors of war. Three years before he left his native country, Goya produced 14 paintings directly onto the plaster walls of his farmhouse. These works, collectively known as The Black Paintings (1821), depicted terrifying supernatural themes and heinous violence.
Living in exile in Bordeaux, France, the artist died on April 16, 1828. His works went on to have a profound influence on both Édouard Manet and Pablo Picasso. Today, Goya’s works are held in the collections of the Art Institute of Chicago, the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, the Prado Museum in Madrid, and the Louvre Museum in Paris, among others.
This is part 3 of a 10-part series on the works of Francisco de Goya:
1786-88 Cartoons for tapestries on “countryside” subjects, 5th series.
1786-87 Boy on a Ram
As painter to the king of Spain, Francisco de Goya also designed tapestries for the royal residences. The artist made small oil sketches to work out the designs, followed by full-scale painted cartoons that served as guides for the weavers at the king’s tapestry works. This cartoon was produced for a tapestry in a series decorating the dining room in the Palace of El Pardo outside Madrid. The room’s large panels illustrate a traditional decorative subject, the four seasons, but Goya exercised his imagination in the smaller panels above the doors, producing scenes of children and animals like this one.
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| 1786-87 Boy on a Ram oil on canvas 127.2 x 121.1 cm Art Institute of Chicago, IL |
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| 1786 Boys with Mastiffs oil on canvas 112 x 145 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| 1786 The injured Mason oil on canvas 256 x 110 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
Two groups of working-class travellers, one with a slaughtered pig in tow, converge on an icy road during a snowstorm. Francisco de Goya captured the scene’s wintry atmosphere with barren trees, large swaths of cool grays and whites, and diagonal brushstrokes that convey rapid snowfall. This small painting is one of a series of studies Goya created for monumental tapestries depicting the four seasons, commissioned for a dining hall at the Royal Palace of El Pardo in Spain. The image would have been scaled up to life-size and then manufactured by weavers in Spain’s Royal Tapestry Factory.
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| c1786 The Snowstorm, or Winter oil on canvas 275 x 293 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| 1786 The Threshing Ground or Summer oil on canvas 277 x 642 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| 1786 The Threshing Ground or Summer detail |
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| 1786 The Threshing Ground or Summer detail |
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| 1786 The Vintage oil on canvas 268 x 190 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| 1786-87 The Poor at the Fountain oil on canvas 277 x 115 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| 1786-87 The Flower Girls or Spring oil on canvas 277 x 192 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| 1786-87 Shepherd playing a Dulzaina oil on canvas 130 x 134 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| 1786-87 Nevada, Spain oil on canvas 275 x 293 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| 1786-87 Magpie in the Tree oil on canvas 279 x 28 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| 1786-87 Cats fighting oil on canvas 56 x 193 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| 1786-87 Cats fighting detail |
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| c1786-88 Hunter by a Spring oil on canvas 130 x 131 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid --------------------------------------------------------- |
1787-88 Condesa de Altamira
This imposing portrait is one of four that Goya painted of members of Count Altamira's family. (Another is the Museum's portrait of Don Manuel Osorio Manrique de Zuñiga [49.7.41].) The patronage of this powerful family greatly advanced the artist's career; shortly after this work was completed, he was appointed court painter to Charles IV, king of Spain. Goya's brilliant treatment of the countess' gown, with its shimmering embroidered silk, attests to his mastery of technique, while the distant, introspective expressions of the sitters reveal his ability to endow even the most formal of portraits with a penetrating psychological immediacy.
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| 1787-88 Condesa de Altamira and her Daughter, María Agustina oil on canvas 195 x 115 cm Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York |
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| 1787-88 Condesa de Altamira detail |
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| 1787-88 Condesa de Altamira detail |
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| 1787-88 Manuel Osorio Manrique de Zuñiga (1784-92) oil on canvas 127 x 101.6 cm Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York |
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| 1787-88 The Duke and Duchess of Osuna and their Children oil on canvas 225 x 174 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| c1787-88 Don Vicente Isabel Osorio de Moscoso y Álvarez de Toledo, Conde de Trastámara oil on canvas 138.4 x 104.1 cm The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, TX |
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| 1788 The Hermitage of Saint Isidor - Pilgrimage to the Church of San Isidro oil on canvas 42 x 44 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| 1788 Blind Man's Bluff oil on canvas 269 x 350 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| 1788 A Picnic oil on canvas 41 x 26 cm The National Gallery, London ------------------------------------------------------ |
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| c1787 The Holy Family oil on canvas 63.5 x 51.5 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| c1787 Tobias and the Angel oil on canvas 63.5 x 51.5 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
1788 Menippus
Goya made these two etchings after Velázquez’s portrait pair re-envisioning the ancient writers Menippus (a satirical playwright) and Aesop (a storyteller). Both men were initially slaves, but became free men. They both appear in the paintings holding books or standing near piles of them, although none of their original writings have survived. Like the portraits of the court dwarves, Goya etched these thinkers on a smaller size sheet of paper than Velázquez’s portraits of contemporary nobles (and sold them at half the price).
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| 1788 Menippus etching with engraved inscription on laid paper 30.5 x 22 cn (plate) |
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| 1788 The Meadow of San Isidro oil on canvas 44 x 94 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| 1788 The Meadow of San Isidro detail |
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| 1788 The Meadow of San Isidro detail |
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| c1789 Tadea Arias de Enríquez oil on canvas 191 x 106 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| 1789 Queen María Luisa in a dress with hooped skirt oil on canvas (size not given) Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| 1789 Carlos IV oil on canvas 203 x 137 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| 1790 Carlos IV oil on canvas 171.3 x 130.5 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| 1790-92 Women chatting oil on canvas 59.1 x 142.9 cm Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, Hartford, CT |
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| 1791-92 Women carrying pitchers oil on canvas 262 x 160 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| 1791-92 The Straw Manikin oil on canvas 267 x 190 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| 1791-92 The Game of Horse and Rider oil on canvas 137 x 104 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| 1791-92 Stilts oil on canvas 268 x 320 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| 1791-92 Boys climbing a tree oil on canvas 141 x 111 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| 1792 The Marriage oil on canvas 269 x 396 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| 1792 The Marriage detail |
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| 1792 The Marriage detail |
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| 1790s Don Pedro, Duque de Osuna oil on canvas 137.8 x 109.2 cm The Frick Collection, New York (On loan to Norton Simon Museum, Pasadena, CA) |
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| 1791 Portrait of Luis María de Cistué y Martínez (School of Goya) oil on canvas 118 x 86.5 cm Louvre, Paris |
1792 Sebastián Martínez y Pérez
Shimmering silk, buttons, and buckles in this sensitive portrait exhibit Goya’s signature paint handling, applied lightly and in semi-transparent layers. Posed perpendicular to the picture plane, the man contemplates a print, only a small corner of which is visible; the paper’s reverse reads "Don Sebastián Martínez by his friend Goya 1792." During a period of illness that led to deafness, Goya spent several months in Martínez’s home in Cádiz, a bustling, international harbor town. Martínez was a famous collector of books, prints, and paintings; he held the position of chief treasurer of the Finance Committee of Cádiz.
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| 1792 Sebastián Martínez y Pérez (1747–1800) oil on canvas 93 x 67.6 cm Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York |
1793 General Antonio Ricardos
The illustrious soldier, Antonio Ricados y Carrillo is depicted by Goya in the battle dress of a Captain General, with the sash of the Order of Carlos and the plaque of that same order on his dress coat. The scallop of the Order of Santiago on his lapel and the triple braid on his cuffs complete the symbols of this Generals high rank. The portrait was made shortly after his death, as he was awarded the third braid after the last battle in which he participated.
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| 1793 General Antonio Ricardos oil on canvas 110 x 81 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| 1793 The Strolling Players oil on tinplate 43 x 32 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| 1794-95 Portrait of the Countess del Carpio, Marquise de la Solana (1757-95) oil on canvas 181 x 122 cm Louvre, Paris |
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| 1794-95 Portrait of the Countess del Carpio detail |
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| 1795 The Duchess of Alba and La Beata oil on canvas 33 x 27.7 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
1795 The Painter Francisco Bayeu
Court Painter, Director of the Academia de San Fernando in Madrid and a key artistic figure in the period, Bayeu was Goya's brother-in-law and their relations were at times extremely tense. This portrait, which was commissioned by Bayeu's daughter for display at the Academy after the artist's death in August 1795, is based on a self-portrait, now in a private collection. Goya emphasises Bayeu's dry and inflexible character through the use of a cool palette of green and silvery grey tones, achieving masterly highlights and transparent effects.
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| 1795 The Painter Francisco Bayeu oil on canvas 112 x 84 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid |
