Francisco de Goya

Datos Generales
Cronología
Ca. 1797 - 1799
Dimensiones
218 x 152 mm
Técnica y soporte
Etching and burnished aquatint
Reconocimiento de la autoría de Goya
Undisputed work
Ficha: realización/revisión
15 Dec 2010 / 29 May 2024
Inventario
225
Inscripciones

Tu que no puedes. (at the bottom)

 42. (in the upper right-hand corner)

Historia

See Francisco de Goya y Lucientes, Painter.

Only one known proof before the handwriting is preserved in the Bibliothèque Nationale de France in Paris with the manuscript title, Como suben los borricos.

A preparatory drawing of this engraving is in the Prado Museum.

Análisis artístico

In the middle of the field, two peasants carry two donkeys on their shoulders, looking happy, while the farmers' faces reflect the dejection and weariness of such a heavy burden.

The aquatint forms a gradient in the sky that goes from the darkest at the top to the lightest at the bottom. Goya has also used the burnisher to create the effect of light on a low horizon.

This image is explained with great clarity in the manuscript in the National Library, which reads: "The poor and useful classes of society are those who carry the donkeys to bed, or bear the full weight of the contributions of the state". This interpretation ties in with the Report of the Economic Society of Madrid to the Royal and Supreme Council of Castile on the agrarian law that Gaspar Melchor de Jovellanos (Gijón, 1744-Puerto de Vega, Navia, 1811) published in 1795 in which he comments on the circumstances in which Spanish peasants found themselves: "Has it not been enough to aggravate their condition by imposing on them the taxes and services that the clergy, the nobility and other less respectable classes were dispensed with? (...) The heaviest and most costly pensions are daily being levied on the farmer as a result of the exemptions granted to other crafts and occupations. The quintas, the bagages, the lodgings, the collection of taxes and stamped paper, and all the council charges burden the unhappy farmer, while the individuals of other classes and professions are exempted from them with a generous hand. Cattle-breeding, carting, and the breeding of mares and colts have obtained them, as if these daughters or servants of agriculture were more worthy of favour than their mother and mistress. The employees of the royal hacienda, the capos de ronda, the guards, the tobacco, card and gunpowder tobacconists, the salt industry employees, and an incredibly large number of other jobs are granted an exemption not granted to the farm labourer".

In this print, the artist captures a vision of the world in which everything seems to work the other way round; it is no longer the men who ride on the backs of the donkeys, but the donkeys who carry them on their backs. Anna Pou points out that this vision has its origins in Aesop's fable of The Donkey and the Miller, which was widely disseminated in Europe throughout the 16th century.

It is also likely that the Aragonese painter had seen pre-revolutionary French prints in which the image of an animal on a person's shoulders was used to censure the enormous weight that people were forced to carry. These images were also valid for our country where, as we have seen, there was a significant increase in taxes to finance the wars and to pay for the privileges of the upper classes and the clergy.

Another hypothetical visual source from which Goya could have drawn inspiration is the coloured engraving by André Basset entitled A faut esperere q'eu se jeu la finira bentot (private collection).

Conservación

The plate is preserved in the National Chalcography (no. 213).

Exposiciones
  • De grafiek van Goya
    Rijksmuseum Rijksprentenkabinet
    Amsterdam
    1970
    from November 13th 1970 to January 17th 1971
  • Goya. Das Zeitalter der Revolucionen. Kunst um 1800 (1980 – 1981)
    Hamburger Kunsthalle
    Hamburg
    1980
  • Goya y el espíritu de la Ilustración
    Museo Nacional del Prado
    Madrid
    1988
    from October 6th to December 18th 1988. Exhibited also at Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, January 18th to March 26th 1989; The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Nueva York, May 9th to July 16th 1989, Madrid curator Manuela B. Mena Marqués, scientific directors Alfonso E. Pérez Sánchez and Eleanor A. Sayre
  • Goya. La década de Los Caprichos
    Madrid
    1992
    organized by Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando sponsored by Fundación Central Hispano, Madrid, consultant editor Nigel Glendinnig. From October 26th 1992 to January 10th 1993
  • Francisco de Goya
    Museo d'Arte Moderna
    Lugano
    1996
    exhibition celebrated from September 22nd to November 17th.
  • Ydioma universal: Goya en la Biblioteca Nacional
    Biblioteca Nacional
    Madrid
    1996
    from September 19th to December 15th 1996
  • 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
  • Das Capriccio als Kunstprinzip
    Wallraf-Richartz-Museum,
    1996
    from December 8th 1996 to February 16th 1997, exhibited also in Zurich, Kunsthaus, from March 14th marzo 1997 to June 1st 1997 and in Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum mi Palais Harrach, from June 29th 1997 to September 21st 1997.
  • Goya artista de su tiempo y Goya artista único
    The National Museum of Western Art
    Tokyo
    1999
    from December 1st to July 3th 1999
  • Goya e la tradizione italiana
    Fondazione Magnani Rocca
    Mamiano di Traversetolo (Parma)
    2006
    consultant editors Fred Licht and Simona Tosini Pizzetti. From September 9th to December 3th 2006
  • Goya. Opera grafica
    Pinacoteca del Castello di San Giorgio
    Legnano
    2006
    exhibition celebrated from December 16th 2006 to April 1st 2007
  • Goya e Italia
    Museo de Zaragoza
    Zaragoza
    2008
    organized by the Fundación Goya en Aragóna, consultant editor Joan Sureda Pons. From June 1st to September 15th 2008
  • Goya et la modernité
    Pinacothèque de Paris
    París
    2013
    from October 11st 2013 to March 16th 2014
  • Goya: Order and disorder
    Museum of Fine Arts
    Boston
    2014
Bibliografía
  • HARRIS, Tomás
    Goya engravings and lithographs, vol. I y II.
    Bibliography']['number
    OxfordBruno Cassirer
    1964
    p.114, cat. 77
  • GASSIER, Pierre y WILSON, Juliet
    Vie et ouvre de Francisco de Goya
    Bibliography']['number
    ParísOffice du livre
    1970
    p.181, cat. 534
  • WILSON BAREAU, Juliet
    Goya, la década de los caprichos: dibujos y aguafuertes
    Bibliography']['number
    MadridReal Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando
    1992
    pp.233-236, cat. 139-141
  • SANTIAGO, Elena M. (coordinadora)
    Catálogo de las estampas de Goya en la Biblioteca Nacional
    Bibliography']['number
    MadridMinisterio de Educación y Cultura, Biblioteca Nacional
    1996
    p.96, cat. 131
  • BLAS BENITO, Javier, MATILLA RODRÍGUEZ, José Manuel y MEDRANO, José Miguel
    El libro de los caprichos: dos siglos de interpretaciones (1799-1999). Catálogo de los dibujos, pruebas de estado, láminas de cobre y estampas de la primera edición
    Bibliography']['number
    MadridMuseo Nacional del Prado
    1999
    pp.234-237
  • POU, Anna
    Francisco Goya. Los Caprichos
    Bibliography']['number
    BarcelonaEdiciones de la Central
    2011
    pp.48-50
  • OROPESA, Marisa and RINCÓN GARCÍA, Wilfredo
    Bibliography']['number
    ParísPinacoteca de París
    2013
    p. 220
  • ILCHMAN, Frederick y STEPANEK, Stephanie L. (comisarios)
    Goya: Order & Disorder
    Bibliography']['number
    BostonMuseum of Fine Arts Boston Publications
    2014
    pp. 336-337
  • WILSON BAREAU, Juliet
    Goya. In the Norton Simon Museum
    Bibliography']['number
    PasadenaNorton Simon Museum
    2016
    pp. 42-75
Enlaces externos
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