Francisco de Goya

What more can be done? (Qué hai que hacer mas?)

Clasificación
What more can be done? (Qué hai que hacer mas?)
Datos Generales
Cronología
Ca. 1812 - 1815
Dimensiones
157 x 207 mm
Técnica y soporte
Aguafuerte, aguatinta, lavis, punta seca y bruñidor
Reconocimiento de la autoría de Goya
Undisputed work
Ficha: realización/revisión
08 Dec 2010 / 24 May 2023
Inventario
225
Inscripciones

42 (on the lower left-hand corner).

Historia

See Sad presentiments of what must come to pass (Tristes presentimientos de lo que ha de acontecer).

The title was handwritten on the print by Goya in the first and only series that is known to have been printed at the time the works were created, which the artist gave to his friend Agustín Ceán Bermúdez. Therefore, the title was etched into the plate at a later date and left unchanged as of the first edition of the Disasters of War printed by the San Fernando Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Madrid in 1863, after the printing of the series in the possession of Ceán Bermúdez.

There is no surviving preparatory drawing of this print.

Análisis artístico

This print depicts a brutal scene of torture. Four French soldiers have captured a Spanish man who they have stripped naked and are holding upside-down against a tree. Two of the soldiers grasp his legs while another observes the scene in the background. The soldier in the foreground with his back to the viewer is holding a sword in both hands ready to cut off his victim's genitals and probably continue mutilating his body.

Mutilation was a practice that was possibly used as a method of humiliating the enemy even after death. Once the victim had been killed, any violent act carried out to the corpse could only have had the purpose of depriving the dead person of their dignity.

This print is linked to no. 37, This is worse (Esto es peor) and no. 39, Great deeds! With dead bodies! (Grande hazaña! Con muertos!), which show mutilated corpses that are missing some of their limbs.

Once again, nature is complicit in a brutal event, providing a support for the ignominious act of dismembering a prisoner's body.

Conservación

La plancha se conserva en la Calcografía Nacional (cat. 284).

Exposiciones
  • Goya. Drawings, Etchings and Lithographs
    Goya. Drawings
    London
    1954
    from June 12th to July 25th 1954
  • Goya nelle collezioni private di Spagne
    Villa Favorita
    Lugano
    1986
    consultant editor Marta Medina. From June 15th to October 15th 1986
  • Francisco Goya. Sein leben im spiegel der graphik. Fuendetodos 1746-1828 Bordeaux. 1746-1996
    Galerie Kornfeld
    Bern
    1996
    from November 21st 1996 to January 1997
  • Francisco Goya. Capricci, follie e disastri della guerra
    San Donato Milanese
    2000
    Opere grafiche della Fondazione Antonio Mazzotta
  • Goya. Opera grafica
    Pinacoteca del Castello di San Giorgio
    Legnano
    2006
    exhibition celebrated from December 16th 2006 to April 1st 2007
  • Goya et la modernité
    Pinacothèque de Paris
    París
    2013
    from October 11st 2013 to March 16th 2014
Bibliografía
  • BERUETE Y MONET, Aureliano de
    Goya, grabador
    MadridBlass S.A.
    1918
    cat. 135
  • HARRIS, Tomás
    Goya engravings and lithographs, vol. I y II.
    OxfordBruno Cassirer
    1964
    cat. 153
  • GASSIER, Pierre y WILSON, Juliet
    Vie et ouvre de Francisco de Goya
    ParísOffice du livre
    1970
    cat. 1048
  • SANTIAGO, Elena M. (coordinadora)
    Catálogo de las estampas de Goya en la Biblioteca Nacional
    MadridMinisterio de Educación y Cultura, Biblioteca Nacional
    1996
    cat. 237
  • OROPESA, Marisa and RINCÓN GARCÍA, Wilfredo
    ParísPinacoteca de París
    2013
    p. 136
  • WILSON BAREAU, Juliet
    Goya. In the Norton Simon Museum
    PasadenaNorton Simon Museum
    2016
    pp. 114-151
Enlaces externos
Volver
Usamos cookies propias y de terceros para mejorar su navegación. Si continua navegando consideramos que acepta el uso de cookies.