A Print Work of Francisco Goya in Iran: Features, Similarities and Differences with Other Works

 
 
Francisco Jose de Goya Lucientes (1746-1828) a Spanish romantic painter and printmaker, is one of the most influential artists in the history of art. Goya is famous for his oil paintings and prints. Carlos IV of Spain and His Family (1800-1801; now in the Prado museum, Rome 032, Madrid, Spain) is one of the most famous of Goya's royal oil paintings. The 2^nd of May 1808 in Madrid or The Fight against Mamelukes, (1814; now in the Prado museum, Rome 064, Madrid, Spain) and the 3^rd of May 1808 in Madrid also known as The Executions (1814; now in the Prado museum, Rome 064, Madrid, Spain) are two of the most important Goya's artworks which depict two scenes of a gruesome and brutal massacre in Madrid, when the Spanish were resisting the attack of the French army. These two masterpieces revel Goya's sensitive and impressionable soul. Traces of the same qualities can also be found in Goya's prints.
Francisco Goya is also known for several print collections in which some of the most important events of the painter's time are depicted. These collections were made in aquatint and etching that are traditionally the process of using strong acid or mordant to cut the unprotected parts of a metal surface to create a design. The first collection of Goya – based on its production date – is The Caprices or Los Caprichos in Spanish (1795-1800) that contains 80 artworks (now in the Prado museum) and illustrates immoral behaviors, including sexual abuse of women, theft , and domestic violence. The Caprices also display Goya's critical views about inquisition and prison system in Spain.
The second print collection is named The Disaster of War, Los desastres de la guerra in Spanish (1808-1820) which is the most influential artwork condemning war in the history of art. Goya made this collection under the influence of the horrific results of Napoleon's attack to Spain. For this reason, the content of prints in The Disaster of War collection is very close to other Goya's masterpieces, The 2^nd and The 3^rd May 1808 in Madrid. This collection represents crime and murder, executions, hanging, piles of corpses, poverty, and horrors after attack. Art historians believe that The Disaster of War collection contains the most catastrophic scenes among Goya's works.
The third print collection is The Proverbs, Los disparates in Spanish, (1813-1819) that demonstrates the consequences of illiteracy, superstition, and ignorance among the common class. The prints of this 18-piece collection represent historical and social issues in a more serious way and less comical concepts than The Caprices does. The Proverbs prints are the reversal of the ignorant traditions of their time.
The fourth group of print works is The Bullfights collection also known as suerte de varas in Spanish (1815). Although this collection apparently represents the old customs and tradition of bullfighting in Spain, in its hidden layers of meaning, it is a representation of the Spanish people’s anger, resistance and fights against the domination and oppression of their government’s occupation. A symbol that has been repeated in many paintings, wall paintings, and statues presents concepts of the resistance and war with the enemy after Goya to the  contemporary days.
The only Goya's work in Iran is a print from The Bullfights collection that is available in the Mostazafan Foundation's Cultural Institution of Museum, The World Art Collection (no. 3967) in Tehran. The present article focuses on this plate and tries to trace the most important features of Goya's works. Apart from presenting the results of above mentioned comparison, this study also provides a detailed description of Tehran's plate which is rarely seen. We compare the features of Tehran's plate with the features other Goya's works. In the same vein, this question is raised:  comparing Tehran's plate with the Caprices and the Disaster of War, which visual features are repeated and which ones are different? To answer this question, the characteristics of Tehran's print work were examined carefully examined and analyzed at the first.
The approximate size of Tehran's print work is 20 in 30 cm. This print which has Goya's face in the form of a raised seal in its margin, is framed by a simple wooden frame with a 10-centimeter- passe-partout. Comparing Tehran's work with other prints of The Bullfights Collection reveals some differences and similarities. For instance, unlike the most of prints, the bullfight represented in Tehran's work does not have any audience. Therefore, compared to other prints in The Bullfights Collection, Tehran's work seems empty and simple at the first glance. However, if we take a closer look at it, we realize the complexities and subtleties of this work: the figures are at the golden point of the scene. The density of the visual elements on the left side of the scene is higher than on the right side because the path of movement of the bull is selected from left to right. The blankness of the right side of the scene (i.e., the path that the bull has in front of itself), induces a sense of the possibility of escape and attack to the right side and added a dynamic aspect to this image.
In Tehran's work, especially in the surrounding space, the hatching is shadowy and soft. Maybe the lack of crowd and the quietness of the scene made the use of this form of hatching more suitable. It was pointed out earlier that based on this observation, the softness of the hatching greatly reduces in the space around the bullfighters in the center of the scene. The hatching in this print is a combination of the techniques used in The Disaster of War and The Caprices. In other words, it can be said that the artist has used methods which are seen in his prior works.
In Tehran's print work, the artist has shown the body of the bullfighters much brighter than the body of the bull by changing the density of the hatching. As a result of this method, the visual value of the image elements and the concept conveyed to viewers indicate the positive and negative poles of the scene. Emphasizing this contrast, the two forces of good and evil are cleverly depicted. Among others prominent features of the Tehran's print work are centralism, unity of the subject, unique hatching, and variety of lines to promote displaying the form which especially reminds the artist's experiences in production of The Disaster of War collection.
By comparing the two collections of The Bullfights and The Disaster of The War, it can be said that although both collections are narratives of events in Spain, in The Disaster of The War collection, Goya is the sole narrator of oppression, but in The Bullfights collection he wants to rise against this oppression. In The Bullfight collection, the artist wants to remind the resistance of the Spanish people and the possibility of taking back their country. He also portrays values and traditions that he worries are being forgotten. All the artistic features of two collections confirm the above statement.
This study demonstrates that in the Bullfights collection and of course in the Tehran's print work that we have a special look at, Goya used fewer details and provided a holistic picture as a representative of Spanish customs and culture. This is unlike the other two collections in which the artist included more details to replicate the haunting images he saw in his nightmares, originated from horrendous external realities of his contemporary Spain. The Bullfight collection is the potential power of the Spanish people which Francisco Goya loudly announces the possibility of its actualization.