- Cronología
- Ca. 1808 - 1812
- Ubicación
- Marquis of La Romana Collection, Madrid, Spain
- Dimensiones
- 40 x 32 cm
- Técnica y soporte
- Oil on canvas
- Reconocimiento de la autoría de Goya
- Documented work
- Titular
- Marquis of La Romana Collection
- Ficha: realización/revisión
- 11 May 2010 / 15 Jun 2023
The complete series of eleven paintings was acquired from Goya by the Majorcan collector Juan de Salas, father of Dionisia Salas y Boxadors, who was married to Pedro Caro y Sureda (Palma de Mallorca, 1761-Cartaxo, Portugal, 1811), III Marquis of La Romana.
The painting was inherited by its current owners.
Three of the eight paintings in this series are closely related to one another, depicting as they do a series of events: Bandits Shooting their Prisoners, Bandit Stripping a Woman and Bandit Murdering a Woman.
In the centre of the composition, a woman is being stripped of her clothes by a man. She is concealing her face with one hand whilst turning away from the viewer. On the left-hand side of the canvas a second man has done the same to another woman, who is already completely naked and is clasping her hands together, probably pleading for mercy. Meanwhile, another bandit, largely hidden from view, keeps watch in the entrance to the cave in which the scene is set.
Goya has depicted this space through the use of broad brushstrokes. The light floods in violently from the right-hand side, illuminating the half-naked body of the standing woman, perhaps in an attempt to emphasize her innocence. The light reveals her with the same aggressiveness with which the bandit is pulling off her clothes.
This work reflects the climate that predominated in Spain during the Spanish War of Independence. It depicts an episode of violence committed against women, an issue which Goya also tackled in some of the images in the Disasters of War series of etchings (no. 9, They don't want to, no. 11, Nor these, and no. 13, Bitter presence, for example).
See rec. no.
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Goya 1900Ministerio de Instrucción Pública and Bellas ArtesMadrid1900consultant editors Aureliano de Beruete, Alejandro Ferrant, Marqués de Pidal and Ricardo Velázquez. May 1900cat. 60
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Pinturas de GoyaMuseo Nacional del PradoMadrid1928consultant editor Fernando Álvarez de Sotomayor. From April to May 1928cat. 5
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Goya. El Capricho y la Invención. Cuadros de gabinete, bocetos y miniaturasMuseo Nacional del PradoMadrid1993from November 18th 1993 to February 15th 1994. Exhibited also at the Royal Academy of Arts, London, March 18th to June 12th 1994 and The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, July 16th to October 16th 1994, consultant editors Manuela B. Mena Marqués and Juliet Wilson-Bareaucat. 77
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GoyaBasle2021p. 220
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L'œuvre peint de Goya. 4 volsParís1928-1950p. 231, cat. 197
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Vie et ouvre de Francisco de GoyaParísOffice du livre1970p. 263, cat. 916
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BarcelonaPolígrafa1970vol. I, pp. 294 y 295, cat. 348
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Francisco de Goya, 4 vols.ZaragozaCaja de Ahorros de Zaragoza, Aragón y Rioja1980-1982vol. III, p. 192
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Goya. El capricho y la invención. Cuadros de gabinete, bocetos y miniaturasMadridMuseo del Prado1993pp. 276, 277, 278, y 280 (il.), cat. 77