Goya
Witness of His Time

“Goya is always a great artist and often a terrifying artist… adding to the Spanish satirical spirit, fundamentally joyful and humorous, as it was in the time of Cervantes, something much more modern, a quality that is highly appreciated in modern times, as is love for the indefinable, a terrifying sense of nature, of human features that have acquired animal characteristics…”

Charles Baudelaire, Curiosités Esthetiques (1868)

The exhibition traces the artistic path of one of the greatest masters in art history. Being the successor of the predominant art tradition of the times before him, Goya is commemorated as the precursor of the modern narrative. Bearing witness to a turbulent period in Spain and Europe, Goya reflects the social circumstances of the era with a critical perspective. The exhibition unites his various oil paintings and engraving series and shed light on Goya’s extraordinary imagination with his realistic and at times frigthening style that makes him one of the best narrators of darkness.

Francisco de Goya was born on March 30th 1746 in Zaragoza as the fourth child of a couple formed by the gilder José Goya and Gracia Lucientes. Goya first began his schooling in the Escuelas Pías, where he coincided with his best friend Martín Zapater. After he attended to the school of the painter José Luzán where he learned the essence of Aragonese painting.

In 1775, Goya moved to Madrid, summoned by the court painter Antonio Rafael Mengs, possibly at the request of his brother-in-law Francisco Bayeu, to work as painter of models in the Royal Tapestry Factory of Santa Bárbara. On 1786, he was appointed royal painter and after the crowning of Charles IV on 1789, Goya became court painter. In 1799, he appointed as the first court painter.