1746-1828
Goya was born in the small village of Fuendetodos near Saragossa in 1746. Upon leaving school he was apprenticed to a local artist. In 1763 he went to Madrid and failed to gain entry into the Academy but continued to study at the studio of the court painter Francisco Bayeu, whose sister, Josefa, Goya married in 1773. After a trip to Italy to study the Renaissance masters, Goya returned to Spain and began to build a successful career as a portrait painter. In 1786 he was appointed court painter to the king, Charles 111 and his successor Charles 1V.
Goya’s life and art changed dramatically in1792 after suffering a mysterious and traumatic illness, which left him deaf. Whilst recovering Goya’s friendship with the recently widowed Duchess of Alba grew causing a great scandal in Spanish society. His work took a darker tone, he slowly turned away from society portraiture and his paintings became much more personal, dealing with the morbid, the bizarre and the menacing. A prime subject matter of this period was the war in Spain after Napoleon’s invasion and the ousting of the Spanish royal family. Dark times continued for Goya, his wife died in 1812, and after the restoration of the king in 1814, he was called in front of the Inquisition to answer charges of obscenity. This was followed by another serious illness in 1819. All this led to Goyas retreat from public life and he devoted himself to his sombre black paintings (pinturas negras) full of demons, the grotesque and mis-shapen people. He eventually retired to Bordeaux and died there in 1828,
No comments:
Post a Comment