Francisco Goya: 12 works

'It was part of a series of portraits commissioned to Goya, the most important Spanish painter of the 18th century, by Don Luis de Borbon, the father of the sitter as well as the artist's patron.'

'While the painting's pale tones reflect the last stages of the rococo in Spanish art, the overall silvery gray--green tonality is equally reminiscent of the earlier Spanish master, Velázquez, whose paintings Goya had studied and copied.'

'The Boweses purchased this painting together with Goya's portrait of Juan Antonio Melendéz Valdés and over seventy other Spanish paintings.'

'/ The strong influence of Murillo pervades the picture, which means that Goya probably painted it while staying in Seville in 1798.'

'Similarities have been pointed out between the model of female personifying Psyche and the one that posed for Goya's 'Majas', and with María Gabriela Palafox y Portocarrero, Marquesa de Lazán, painted by Goya in 1804.'

'Goya's caption, the drawing's title, tells the whole story: He admonishes her for playing at being a peasant, a practice then fashionable among the upper classes.'

'As court painter to both Charles III and Charles IV of Spain, Goya achieved considerable fame as a portraitist.'

'Goya's Forge, painted about 1815-20, with its pervasive darkness, vigorous brushstrokes, and proletarian subjectmatter, introduces a note of harsh realism into the generally calm and restful pictures in The Frick Collection.'

'Goya's fantastic imagery is often infused with satirical irony.'

'Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes painted this work late in his career when he had begun experimenting with different techniques.'

'This drawing comes from "Album G," one of the two albums Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes compiled when he was living in Bordeaux at the end of his life.'