GOYA: THE PORTRAITS
7 October 2015 – 10 January 2016
Sainsbury Wing
Francisco de Goya (1746 -1828) is one of Spain's most celebrated artists. He was considered a supremely gifted portrait painter and an excellent social commentator who took the genre of portraiture to new heights through his ability to reveal the psychology of his sitter.
This landmark exhibition - the first ever focusing solely on his portraits - will re-appraise Goya's genius as a portraitist and provide a penetrating insight into both public and private aspects of his life. It will explore Goya's ambitions and development as a painter, and his innovative and unconventional approach to portraiture which often broke traditional boundaries.
The exhibition will trace Goya's career from his early beginnings at the court of Charles III in Madrid to his appointment as First Court Painter to Charles IV, through the difficult period under Joseph Bonaparte and then Ferdinand VII, which nevertheless saw some of his finest work, and then his final years in France.
By bringing together more than 50 of his most outstanding portraits from around the world, including drawings and miniatures, and organising them in a chronological and thematic sequence, the show will enable viewers to engage for the first time with the full range of Goya's technical, stylistic and psychological development as a portraitist.