Auto-da-fé

This canvas shows an auto-da-fé, in which the victim of the Holy Office is awaiting condemnation on a wooden stage, beneath which there is a crowd who have come to see the show. The darkness set against the white light in the top right corner combined with the painting’s expressive brushstrokes dramatizes the atmosphere of the scene. / In the years in which Eugenio Lucas Velázquez painted, the Inquisition had already been abolished (first in 1820 and later more definitively in 1834). However, the last Inquisition condemnation occurred in 1826, the echoes of which still resounded at the time the painter was working. / The subject of the Inquisition allowed Lucas to express his ideological concerns and criticisms of the Romantic social context. It is especially representative of his paintings, which bore the direct influence of the teachings of Francisco de Goya.