Word: goya
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...show, which runs from April 15 through mid-July in Madrid, is the Prado's first major Goya retrospective since 1996. It includes nearly 200 paintings, etchings and drawings, many of which come from private collections and have never been publicly displayed. In fact, although the Prado holds the world's largest trove of works by Goya, only a fifth of the pieces in this exhibition come from its collection. All were completed between 1794 and 1820, the period that begins with Goya's recovery from a grave illness that left him deaf, and traverses the bloody years of Spain...
That conflict, which began in 1808 and pitted ragtag bands of peasants against Napoleon's imperial army, provides the bicentennial occasion for "Goya in Times of War." But in no sense is the show a commemoration of the glories of battle. "For Goya the war was a disaster, a shock for his nation and a shock to his Enlightenment ideas," says Manuela Mena, the exhibition's curator. "You can see his skepticism, his loss of faith in humanity...
...renewed colors do more than add vibrancy; they help Goya tell his story. Released from decades of yellowed varnish, a tiny white spot in The Second of May draws the gaze to a horse's muzzle, and from there, up to the animal's penetrating eyes, which stare at the viewer in terrified accusation, as if to say, "Look at what you've done." Bloodspecked bodies crumpled at the bottom of each painting now form a single visual line and provide a graphic reminder that the French massacre of "innocent" militiamen occurred only after the Spanish had slaughtered their share...
Which is not to say that the exhibit is unrelentingly grim. The early years of the 19th century were a time of tremendous creativity for Goya, and the full range of his talent is on display in this show. His modernity is evident not only in his dark depictions of human irrationality, but in his psychologically acute portraits. From his warm, intimate portrayal of Spanish King Charles IV and his family, to the petulant knowingness of the young Marchioness de Montehermoso, to the vague disappointment of the slightly mustachioed Doña Juana Galarza, who clutches a crumpled...
Nevertheless, few subjects escape the artist's bleak skepticism. Still lifes tend to comment on the transience of things, but Goya's piles of lifeless fish and game lend unexpected violence to this theme: the white fur of a rabbit's belly exposes the wound where it was shot; the blank eyes of a lamb's skull look disconsolately at its butchered torso. Equally unsettling, a large painting of The Taking of Christ is notable less for the sorrowful figure at its center than for the jeering, crazed mob that surrounds him. The same menacing irrationality appears in disturbing later...