Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes was a Spanish romantic painter and printmaker. He is considered the most important Spanish artist of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. His paintings, drawings, and engravings reflected contemporary historical upheavals and influenced important 19th- and 20th-century painters. Goya is often referred to as the last of the Old Masters and the first of the moderns.
Printmaking is the process of creating artworks by printing, normally on paper, but also on fabric, wood, metal, and other surfaces. "Traditional printmaking" normally covers only the process of creating prints using a hand processed technique, rather than a photographic reproduction of a visual artwork which would be printed using an electronic machine ; however, there is some cross-over between traditional and digital printmaking, including risograph.
Aquatint is an intaglio printmaking technique, a variant of etching that produces areas of tone rather than lines. For this reason it has mostly been used in conjunction with etching, to give both lines and shaded tone. It has also been used historically to print in colour, both by printing with multiple plates in different colours, and by making monochrome prints that were then hand-coloured with watercolour.
Los Caprichos is a set of 80 prints in aquatint and etching created by the Spanish artist Francisco Goya in 1797–1798 and published as an album in 1799. The prints were an artistic experiment: a medium for Goya's satirizing Spanish society at the end of the 18th century, particularly the nobility and the clergy. Goya in his plates humorously and mercilessly criticized society while aspiring to more just laws and a new educational system. Closely associated with the Enlightenment, the criticisms are far-ranging and acidic. The images expose the predominance of superstition, religious fanaticism, the Inquisition, religious orders, the ignorance and inabilities of the various members of the ruling class, pedagogical shortcomings, marital mistakes, and the decline of rationality.
The Third of May 1808 in Madrid is a painting completed in 1814 by the Spanish painter Francisco Goya, now in the Museo del Prado, Madrid. In the work, Goya sought to commemorate Spanish resistance to Napoleon's armies during the occupation of 1808 in the Peninsular War. Along with its companion piece of the same size, The Second of May 1808, it was commissioned by the provisional government of Spain at Goya's own suggestion shortly after the ousting of the French occupation and the restoration of King Ferdinand VII.
The Disasters of War is a series of 82 prints created between 1810 and 1820 by the Spanish painter and printmaker Francisco Goya (1746–1828). Although Goya did not make known his intention when creating the plates, art historians view them as a visual protest against the violence of the 1808 Dos de Mayo Uprising, the subsequent cruel war that ended in Spanish victory in the Peninsular War of 1808–1814 and the setbacks to the liberal cause following the restoration of the Bourbon monarchy in 1814. During the conflicts between Napoleon's French Empire and Spain, Goya retained his position as first court painter to the Spanish crown and continued to produce portraits of the Spanish and French rulers. Although deeply affected by the war, he kept private his thoughts on the art he produced in response to the conflict and its aftermath.
The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters or The Dream of Reason Produces Monsters is an aquatint by the Spanish painter and printmaker Francisco Goya. Created between 1797 and 1799 for the Diario de Madrid, it is the 43rd of the 80 aquatints making up the satirical Los caprichos.
The Colossus, is known in Spanish as El Coloso and also El Gigante, El Pánico and La Tormenta. It is a painting traditionally attributed to Francisco de Goya that shows a giant in the centre of the canvas walking towards the left hand side of the picture. Mountains obscure his legs up to his thighs and clouds surround his body; the giant appears to be adopting an aggressive posture as he is holding one of his fists up at shoulder height. A dark valley containing a crowd of people and herds of cattle fleeing in all directions occupies the lower third of the painting.
Witches' Sabbath or The Great He-Goat are names given to an oil mural by the Spanish artist Francisco Goya, completed sometime between 1821 and 1823. It depicts a Witches' Sabbath. It evokes themes of violence, intimidation, ageing and death; Satan hulks in the form of a goat in moonlit silhouette over a coven of terrified old witches. Goya was then around 75 years old, living alone and suffering from acute mental and physical distress.
Los disparates, also known as Proverbios (Proverbs) or Sueños (Dreams), is a series of prints in etching and aquatint, with retouching in drypoint and engraving, created by Spanish painter and printmaker Francisco Goya between 1815 and 1823. Goya created the series while he lived in his house near Manzanares on the walls of which he painted the famous Black Paintings. When he left to France and moved in Bordeaux in 1824, he left these works in Madrid apparently incomplete. During Goya's lifetime, the series was not published because of the oppressive political climate and of the Inquisition.
La Tauromaquia (Bullfighting) is a series of 33 prints created by the Spanish painter and printmaker Francisco Goya, which was published in 1816. The works of the series depict bullfighting scenes. There are also seven extra prints that were not published in the original edition.
Eleanor Axson Sayre was an American curator, art historian, and a specialist on the works of Goya. She was the first woman to serve as departmental curator at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Working as curator of prints and drawings, she collected Goya's etchings from museums around the world to catalogue and create international exhibits. She was awarded a knighthood with the Lazo de Dama in the Order of Isabella the Catholic by Spain in 1975 and the Gold Medal of Merit in the Fine Arts in 1991.
A way of flying is a print by the Spanish painter and printmaker Francisco Goya. Created between 1815 and 1816, it is the 13th of the 22 aquatints making up the series Los disparates. Along with the rest of the series it was first published in 1864 by the Real Academia de Nobles Artes de San Fernando.
In printmaking, surface tone, or surface-tone, is produced by deliberately or accidentally not wiping all the ink off the surface of the printing plate, so that parts of the image have a light tone from the film of ink left. Tone in printmaking meaning areas of continuous colour, as opposed to the linear marks made by an engraved or drawn line. The technique can be used with all the intaglio printmaking techniques, of which the most important are engraving, etching, drypoint, mezzotint and aquatint. It requires individual attention on the press before each impression is printed, and is mostly used by artists who print their own plates, such as Rembrandt, "the first master of this art", who made great use of it.
The Prisoners is a series of three etchings by Francisco de Goya, depicting imprisoned men with indistinct faces, bound with leg irons in stress positions. The prints are not dated, but they are believed to have been made between 1810 and 1815, around the time Goya started his print series The Disasters of War. Political considerations made it impossible for Goya to publish the prints during his lifetime.
The Witches' Kitchen is a painting by the Spanish artist Francisco Goya, located in a private collection in Mexico. It is part of a series of six cabinet paintings, each measuring approximately 43 × 30 cm, with the theme of witchcraft. The paintings do not together form a single narrative and do not share a common meaning, so it is appropriate to interpret each one individually. The entire series was owned by the Dukes of Osuna and adorned their summer residence, Alameda de Osuna. In addition to The Witches' Kitchen, the series includes: Witches' Sabbath, Witches' Flight, The Incantation, The Bewitched Man, and Don Juan and the Commendatore. Four of the paintings are in various public collections, one in a private collection, and the last is considered lost.
Don Juan and the Commendatore is a painting by the Spanish artist Francisco Goya. It belongs to a series of six cabinet paintings, each approximately 43 × 30 cm, with witchcraft as the central theme. The paintings do not form a single narrative and have no shared meaning, so each one is interpreted individually. The entire series was owned by the Dukes of Osuna and adorned their summer residence in Alameda de Osuna. In addition to Don Juan and the Commendatore, the series includes Witches' Sabbath, Witches' Flight, The Incantation, The Bewitched Man, and The Witches' Kitchen. Four of these paintings are housed in various public collections, one in a private collection, and Don Juan and the Commendatore is considered lost.
The Incantation is a painting by the Spanish artist Francisco Goya. It belongs to a series of six cabinet paintings, each approximately 43 × 30 cm, with witchcraft as the central theme. The paintings do not form a single narrative and have no shared meaning, so each one is interpreted individually. The entire series was owned by the Dukes of Osuna and adorned their summer residence in Alameda de Osuna. In addition to The Incantation, the series includes Witches' Sabbath, Witches' Flight, Don Juan and the Commendatore, The Bewitched Man, and The Witches' Kitchen. Four of the paintings are held in various public collections, one in a private collection, and the last is considered lost.
