Goya's Prison: - Red Square Design

Goya’s Prison – the Year of Despair explores the story
behind these dark images and what compelled Goya
to paint them.
By 1792, Goya, approaching forty-six, had become
bored with painting cartoons for the Royal Tapestry
Factory. (Fig.10) Since 1775 he had painted more than
sixty, full size, colour compositions. Some were huge.
The money was good, but they were only for Royal
consumption, and no wider audience saw them. In
any case, the very nature of translating Goya’s painted
images into large scale tapestry production forced
his technique to limit its expressiveness. Goya’s
career was at a crossroads. Although he had achieved
acclaim and patronage as a painter of portraits, genre
and religious scenes, it appears that he was not where
he wanted to be. His destiny was determined after he
was stricken by an illness that remains a mystery to
this day. Whatever the cause of the illness, the year
that followed marked a turning point in defining the
career of one of Western art’s greatest masters.
In October 1792, just before his illness struck, Goya
had been one of a number of Academicians who
addressed the Royal Academy with ideas for reforms
in the teaching of art. Goya spoke passionately against
the imposition of rules in painting and of a common
curriculum to be forced upon all students. He criticised
those who lauded the perfection of Greek statues as
subject matter above the study of nature. Goya asked
his audience:
“What statue or cast of it might there be that
is not copied from divine nature? As excellent
as the artist may be who copied it, can he not
but proclaim that when placed at its side, one
is the work of God and the other of our own
miserable hands?” 6
Standing at the centre of the cultural elite of Madrid,
Goya’s statement demonstrated his desire for all
artists to enjoy an uninhibited freedom of expression
and unbridled exploration of the imagination.
9 Yard with Lunatics
Francisco de Goya
1793-4
Oil on tinplate 43.5 x 32.4cm
Dallas, Meadows Museum,
Southern Methodist University
5
Goya’s Prison – the Year of Despair