This is a complete list of Francisco Goya's 63 large cartoons for tapestries (Spanish: cartones para tapices) painted on commission for Charles III of Spain and later Charles IV of Spain between 1775 and 1791 to hang in the San Lorenzo de El Escorial and El Pardo palaces. The word "cartoon" is derived from the Italian cartone, which describes a large sheet of paper used in preparation for a later painting or tapestry.[1] Goya's were executed on canvas which was then woven into wool tapestry to a large mural scale. While many of the large finished works are today in the Prado Museum, the original sketches were sold as works in their own right.[2]
In 1774, Goya was asked by the German artist Anton Raphael Mengs, acting on behalf of the Spanish crown, to undertake the series. While designing tapestries was neither prestigious nor well paid, Goya used them, along with his early engravings, to bring himself to wider attention.[3] They afforded his first contact with the Spanish monarchy that was to eventually appoint him court painter.[4] The works are mostly popularist in a rococo style, and were completed early in his career, when he was largely unknown and actively seeking commissions. There is evidence that he later regretted having spent so much effort and time on the pieces, and that his later darker period, which begins roughly with Yard with Lunatics, was in part a reaction against them.
By 1776, aged 29, he had completed five tapestries, by the Real Fábrica de Tapices de Santa Bárbara, the royal tapestry manufactory. His brother-in-law Francisco Bayeu was made director of the tapestry works in 1777, which greatly advanced the ambitious artist's career prospects.[5] However, Goya was beset by illness during the period, and his condition was used against him by the contemporary art scene, which looked jealously upon any artist seen to be rising in stature. Some of the larger cartoons, such as The Wedding, were more than 8 by 10 feet, and had proved a drain on his physical strength. Ever resourceful, Goya turned this misfortune around, claiming that his illness had allowed him the insight to produce works that were more personal and informal.[6] However, he found the format limiting, because being inherently matte, tapestry was unable to capture complex colour shift or texture, and was unsuited to the impasto and glazing techniques he was by then applying to his painted works.[7]
Dating the series has not been difficult as the Royal Tapestry Works maintained a detailed record of the dates, titles, sizes and states in which each of the cartoons arrived. Goya's letters to his friends (in particular his correspondence with the Aragonese industrialist Martín Zapater) contain additional details.
Groupings
Self-portrait by Goya (1771-1775), shortly before beginning the first series of cartoons. 58 × 44 cm. Collection of Marquesa de Zurgena, Madrid
The series can be divided into a number of groups based on intended location or theme. Art historians Valeriano Bozal and Nigel Glendinning arrange the series in four groups,[8][9] whereas Janis Tomlinson places them in seven.[10] The Goya catalogue of the Museo del Prado is closer to Tomlinson than to Bozal or Glendinning, but attempts to reconcile the two positions by grouping the cartoons into five sequences.[11]
Goya had at first wanted to paint French or Dutch pastoral scenes, however Charles IV preferred "entertainments and clothing of the present time". This afforded Goya the opportunity to study closely his fellow citizens going about their daily lives,[2] and allowed him to work outside of ecclesiastical commissions, which he often found dull and uninspiring.[12] In general the cartoons are playful and depict the leisure activities of a variety of ages and social classes. Nine are hunting scenes that were for the dining room at the Escorial, which pleased the king's son—the future Charles IV—who was an avid hunter. A further ten were created for the dining room at El Pardo.[13] The prince's wife, Maria Luisa, enjoyed the scenes of dancing and singing. The works are painted in the then-fashionable Rococo style, and heavily influenced by Antoine Watteau, whose work Goya came to know through his studies of Titian.[14]
1 2 3 4 5 It is difficult to determine to which series these works belong. (El majo de la guitarra, El columpio, El juego de la pelota a pala, El niño del árbol and El muchacho del pájaro.) Most critics place them in the third series, while Tomlinson places them in the fourth.
Mena Márquez, Manuela de. Goya: guía de sala, Madrid, Tf, 2008. ISBN978-84-95452-46-7.
Tomlinson, Janis A. Francisco de Goya: los cartones para tapices y los comienzos de su carrera en la Corte de Madrid, Madrid, Cátedra, 1993. ISBN84-376-1192-X.
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.
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.
The Parasol is one of a cartoon series of oil on linen paintings made by the painter Francisco Goya. This series of paintings was specifically made in order to be transformed into tapestries that would be hung on the walls of the Royal Palace of El Pardo in Madrid, Spain. The tapestries showed serene events in everyday life, which made them a nice addition to the dining room of Prince and Princess of Asturias—the future King Charles IV and Maria Luisa of Parma. The queen called on Goya because she wanted to decorate the dining room with cheerful scenes; The Parasol and the other tapestry paintings were Goya's response to this request. The painting is currently located in the Museo del Prado in Madrid as is another in the series, Blind man's bluff.
Blind Man's Bluff is one of the Rococo oil-on-linen cartoons produced by the Spanish artist Francisco de Goya for tapestries for the Royal Palace of El Pardo. The work shows boys and girls playing the popular pastime "blind man's bluff" with one figure in the middle blindfolded and holding a large spoon while trying to entice others dancing around him in a circle.
Atropos, or The Fates is one of the 14 Black Paintings painted by Francisco de Goya between 1819–1823. Goya, then 75 and in mental and physical despair, created the series directly onto the interior walls of the house known as the Quinta del Sordo, purchased in 1819.
Judith and Holofernes is the name given to one of the 14 Black Paintings painted by Francisco de Goya between 1819 and 1823. By this time, Goya was in his mid 70s and deeply disillusioned. In mental and physical despair, he painted the private works on the interior walls of his home—applying oils directly on plaster—known as the Quinta del Sordo, which he had purchased in 1819. Judith and Holofernes was likely painted on the first floor, beside Saturn Devouring His Son. The picture is a personal reinterpretation of the narrative of the Book of Judith, in which the protagonist saves Israel from the assault of the general Holofernes by seducing and beheading him. Judith is the only historical figure who can be identified with certainty among the Black Paintings.
A Pilgrimage to San Isidro is one of the Black Paintings painted by Francisco de Goya between 1819–23 on the interior walls of the house known as Quinta del Sordo that he purchased in 1819. It probably occupied a wall on the first floor of the house, opposite The Great He-Goat.
Two Old Men, also known as Two Monks or An Old Man and a Monk, are names given to one of the 14 Black Paintings painted by Francisco Goya between 1819-23. At the time Goya was in his mid-seventies and was undergoing a great amount of physical and mental stress after two bouts of an unidentified illness. The works were rendered directly onto the interior walls of the house known as Quinta del Sordo, which Goya purchased in 1819.
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.
The Black Paintings is the name given to a group of 14 paintings by Francisco Goya from the later years of his life, likely between 1819 and 1823. They portray intense, haunting themes, reflective of both his fear of insanity and his bleak outlook on humanity. In 1819, at the age of 72, Goya moved into a two-story house outside Madrid that was called Quinta del Sordo. Although the house had been named after the previous owner, who was deaf, Goya too was nearly deaf at the time as a result of an unknown illness he had suffered when he was 46. The paintings originally were painted as murals on the walls of the house, later being "hacked off" the walls and attached to canvas by owner Baron Frédéric Émile d'Erlanger. They are now in the Museo del Prado in Madrid.
The Royal Tapestry Factory is a factory making tapestries in Madrid, Spain, which was founded in 1720 and is still in operation.
Jean Laurent or, in Spanish, Juan Laurent Minier; sometimes simply J. Laurent was a French photographer who mostly worked in Spain.
Boys playing soldiers is a 1778-79 tapestry cartoon by Francisco of Goya conceived for the bedroom of the Princes of Asturias in the Royal Palace of El Pardo. It is presently exhibited in the Museo del Prado. A sketch of the artwork is kept nowadays in the Yanduri Collection of Seville.
Summer or The Threshing Floor is the largest cartoon painted by Francisco de Goya as a tapestry design for Spain's Royal Tapestry Factory. Painted from 1786 to 1787, it was part of his fifth series, dedicated to traditional themes and intended for the heir to the Spanish throne and his wife. The tapestries were to hang in the couple's dining room at the Pardo Palace.
Francisco Javier Sánchez Cantón (1891–1971) was a Spanish art historian, who from 1960 to 1968 was Director of the Museo del Prado.
Children in a Chariot is a 1779 painting by Francisco de Goya. It is part of the third series of cartoons he produced for tapestries at the Royal Palace of El Pardo; the tapestry in question was to be positioned over a door. The painting is in the Toledo Museum of Art.
The Drunk Mason is an oil on canvas painted by Francisco de Goya, then reputed painter of tapestries for the royal palaces. It belonged to the fifth series undertaken by Goya, and, like all the pieces that compose it, was painted between 1786 and 1787.
The series of paintings for the alameda of the Dukes of Osuna comprises seven pictures painted by Francisco de Goya between 1786 and 1787. The country estate of the dukes and duchesses, who were the painter's mecenas and friends, was known as El Capricho, and was located on the outskirts of Madrid.
The tapestry cartoons of Francisco de Goya are a group of oil on canvas paintings by Francisco de Goya between 1775 and 1792 as designs for the Royal Tapestry Factory of Santa Barbara near Madrid in Spain. Although they are not the only tapestry cartoons made at the Royal Factory, they are much the best known. Most of them represent bucolic, hunting, rural and popular themes. They strictly adhered to the tastes of King Charles III and the princes Charles of Bourbon and Maria Luisa of Parma, and were supervised by other artists of the factory such as Maella and the Bayeu family. Most are now in the Museo del Prado, having remained in the Spanish Royal collection, although there are some in art galleries in other countries.
The Swing is the title of a tapestry cartoon designed by Francisco de Goya for the bedroom of the Princes of Asturias in the Palace of El Pardo. It is kept in the Museo del Prado.
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