The Illustration In Spain: Influences In Goya

The illustration in Spain: influences in Goya

Historical-artistic context

Goya was born in Fuendetodos in 1746, an agricultural town with a peasant society, and died in 1828 in Bordeaux, a city that enjoyed a settled bourgeoisie and a sanitized economy. This historical period is called in general illustration, which entails a substantial change in Spain. Goya lives this period telling not the great events as all French painters did, but told what daily life meant, a prototype of modernity being Goya because of the way he carried out this.

Due to the geographical proximity between France and Spain it is said that the Enlightenment would arrive with all the weight of its secularism, rationalism, Spain, but that was not so because Spanish society was completely different from the French. In French society there was a very strong bourgeoisie that gave a rhythm to events, and in Spain the society of the old regime survived, with absolute regimes and where the bourgeoisie had been losing weight since the 16th century, while the nobility continued to retain itsprivileges. The weight of the Catholic Church had increased in its possession and possessions.

For all this, the possibility that the echoes of the illustration arrived was minimal, being able to give the Spanish throne an enlightened king, which could open the way to the new. This was what happened in Spain since the beginning of the 18th century with Felipe V. At the same time, it is quite normal for a king like Felipe V, who did not belong to Austria’s house, promote a culture and rely on completely different ideas since it was French.

Therefore, the monarchy of Felipe V begins to boost the critical spirit.

In addition to all that, there was always a small minority, the enlightened ones, who were the country’s advance, that is, people who without abandoning the Catholic religion promoted the changes to arrive the ideas of the lights to the country. This minority enjoyed great prestige when the only thing that could make Spain came into the Enlightenment, which was with the arrival of Carlos III, the great enlightened monarch of Spain. But as soon as the French Revolution occurred, those enlightened became dangerous revolutionary since they were farms. The course of the 18th century must be understood as a short period of modernity, as an impulse that remained in the substrate of society and paid off.

As for the art of the 18th century in Spain, important changes are given. In the first place there is a tiredness of a painting that had been naturalistic and idealistic and at the same time there is an misunderstanding by the new monarchy for everything that is Spanish culture, since when a French king, Felipe V, first Bourbon arrived, first Bourbon, caused a reciprocal situation to occur: the Spaniards are not accommodated to the French and French tastes are not accommodated to Spanish tastes, that is, that somehow that also affects the delay that was in art and cultureSpaniards to start the Enlightenment.

Felipe V, first Bourbon monarch, begins to impose certain tastes, especially begins to see that it is necessary to reform society. The most open minds agree that everything must be renewed to up to the circumstances of the circumstances. In addition, there are a series of issues, such as the foundation of the art academies, as an instrument that has the monarchy to from above try to drive all artistic production towards the classic ideal with which France felt comfortable. Therefore, a weighted, measured art will be produced very soon, since the beginning of the century is criticized the traditional Spanish baroque of Churriguera, so that baroque architecture was censored by the reformist elite of the second half of the 18th century. The neoclassical movement was a purely formal issue that pretended through art to contribute to the healing of a backward society. This new critical attitude is linked to the evils of society (begging, prostitution), because it serves as a stimulus for creation (critical works, documentary works).

This results in foreign camera painters, leaving the Spanish camera painters below. Felipe V was the king who began to bring French painters, but despite that he kept one of the painters that Carlos II had, who was Luca Giordano, the most important baroque decorator of the time. But Felipe V prefers that a French artist come, so he brings René Houasse as the first camera painter, who comes with his son also a painter, who is the one who really has the most artistic importance. They always prefer portraitist painters, such as Miguel Ángel Hauasse, who makes several official portraits of Felipe V and, really, is a painter well formed for example in gender painting or landscapes.

Miguel Ángel died in 1736 and was replaced by the first Italian painter who arrived: Andrea ProCaccini. In principle Felipe V hires him as a portraitist but when he arrives and sees his work he sends him to direct all the work that is being done in the real site of the farm, so he did not work as a portraitist really.

Anyway, the Bourbon court was needed portraits where the king was magnified, neoclassical style, wanting to bury Baroque art. Thus, they called Juan Rank, who made an equestrian portrait of Felipe V that was lost in the fire of the Royal House, a fact that the same author was blamed. In the time of Fernando VI arrives Van Loo, another French painter with whom it shows how the historical situation has changed. For example, with the representation of Las Meninas de Velázquez (image 1), which represents the family picture of Felipe IV, where the important thing is not the kings, but the characters themselves, in contrast, in the portrait of the family ofFelipe V de Van Loo (Image 2), the work looks like an opera scene with a great feigned landscape and a marble decoration. This is what the change of the naturalist baroque to the painting of the Enlightenment means.

All this remained at the gates that the king who was going to change the entire panorama came: Carlos III. King Carlos III, during his stage in Naples, promoted the excavations of Pompeya and Herculano and also lived the architectural transformation of the Caserta Palace. When arrives in Madrid they are difficult times for him since his wife dies. Carlos III supported the change, being known as the best mayor of Madrid since he reorganized the Madrid of the Enlightenment, carrying out the axis of the Prado, the Puerta de Alcalá, the Academy of Fine Arts … etc.

This period is very important for Goya since it arrives in Madrid when the illustrated policy of Carlos III is starting. Therefore, the kings of the 18th century, which begin in Felipe V and end in Carlos IV, have a short period, the reign of Carlos III, where we seemed that we were going to put ourselves at the level of Europe. This is the panorama to take into account and then say that Goya is an image of modernity but at the same time a paradox: he is an enlightened but not in the sense as such, since he was a friend of the enlightened and lived the Enlightenment,But it did not become. This can be explained through three perspectives:

1. According to Edith Helman, art historian, Goya painted what he saw critically but did not have an intellectual formation as such, so he was not tied to any question and could paint what he wanted, since he was free. There are also Goya letters and documents that mark in its pictorial and intellectual evolution a slow and difficult evolution, fed by curiosity, since Goya advanced slowly, was getting into the illustrated environment little by little and never arrived by an intellectual way, buton a way of customary facts. 
2. Martín Zapater, bourgeois merchant, banker and enlightened, founded the Royal Society of Friends of Aragon and was the first consiliary of the Academy in the field of engravings. These societies of friends were very important in the Enlightenment, since they were meetings where there was no assembly movement. He was a very good merchant who led to scholarships for artists, but in the documentation of the letters with Goya he talks about current and daily things, nothing that was an important project.
3. Ortega y Gasset warned that Goya’s letters help us to specify his mentality, little distant from the manual worker, since he does not see political or intellectual commitment in the figure of Goya. The recipient of these first letters is Martín Zapater. Therefore, according to Ortega y Gasset, he cannot be considered an enlightened as such since he painted what he wanted and as he wanted to be a king’s painter, instead of sticking to the norms. It is true that he had a slow evolution, however, when observing his last self-portrait the old man with two canes confesses that he continues to learn, so he was an artist who considered that he never arrived at the cusp. This confession is necessary to assess it.

Spanish painting before Goya and its influence on it: first half of the 18th century.

Felipe V opted for the French painters, Fernando VI for the Italians and Carlos III when he came to power met the Tiépolo painter, the Venetian painter used to the decoration. During the reign of Fernando VI, there were already decorators of Italian origin in the Royal Palace, including Tiépolo and Luca Giordano. But Carlos III knew perfectly the excavations of Pompeya and Herculano and was perfectly aware of the theory of art and other cultural fields, then he knew the painter, famous already in Europe, which would bring to Spanish painting the policy of the new style: Antón Rafael Mengs(1728-1779), famous painter and philosopher in Europe.

Mengs knew Carlos III because he went to make a portrait and some decorations to Caserta. The first thing he does are portraits for the official places of King Carlos III and Queen María Amalia (Image 5), which are very classic. This leads us to understand how Mengs’s classic portrait will define the genre of the portrait during the 19th century.

This painter was born in Germany, predestined from the moment he was born to be a classic painter since his father forced him from the age of six to correctly draw molds of antiquity, in addition, with twelve years he took him to Rome to directly copy the worksof classicism, as part of the frescoes of Miguel Ángel de la Capilla Sistina. This is because Rome in the 18th century was an international artistic center, so that all painters were going to catch up in the classical world with scholarships. In this way Rome becomes an international focus that hosts different looks, having an exchange of opinions, training systems … etc.

When Carlos III came to Spain and found the city difference between Caserta and Madrid or Italy, he decided to bring Mengs to direct artistic politics and teaching. Carlos III arrived in Madrid in 1760 and Mengs a few months later up to ten years later. Mengs was a great painter, which demonstrates Goya when he performs the tapestry cartons in the royal tapestry factory without following the guidelines of the same, but Mengs understood that in those forms of Goya there was a great promise, being beingOne of the few personalities he did not correct in the Academy.

The return to classicism is not a way to turn back, but on the contrary, it was an innovation, since it is the personal interpretation of each artist with a series of general rules for good painting. Classicism of the 18th century is a new classicism since this interpretation supposes. This is reflected with another of the outstanding painters of the moment: Jean Ranc, French painter. The first picture he made in Spain was Fernando VI’s portrait at age eight, considered French Rococó painting, being a friendly portrait with classic structures. Another of the paintings he performs when he arrives at the Spanish Court, this one for Felipe V, is the portrait of Felipe V on horseback, with a fully idealistic composition.

The contrast of this painting of the French is that of the Italians who begin to arrive with the reign of Fernando VI, such as Tiépolo, the Italian painter in charge of fresh paintings, although he will also make easel paint. Carlos III wanted Mengs to handle everything, so Tiépolo, who had been in Spain for a while, was postponed by Mengs and marched to Italy after making a great production. Tiépolo liked gender painting as well, therefore, as well as in the Spanish painting of the late seventeenth century, their painting is cheerful, they represent the joy of living, social games … etc. In contrast, there is the painting that Mengs brings, for example with the sacred family (image 8), which reminds Rafael’s classicism, for example in the way in which the game of movements is linked in a circle as in a sequence ofundulation of forms, in addition, the predominance of the line on color.

Before coming to Spain Mengs painted a horizontal, narrative painting, in the classical way, the Parnassus. Modern classicism, to break the inertia of the Baroque in the compositions, what it does is dictate the norm of the three units: unit of time, action and place. These three elements in narrative painting have to be present. This rule comes from the French theater, accustomed to ordering the compositions in that way so that the spectators saw the succession of the events in the scenes. Once in Spain, Mengs makes religious paintings like Noli Me tagere, where he uses a combination of Venetian colors reminiscent of El Greco, having many colors without mixing with each other. The relationship between the figure of Christ and the Magdalena stands out, his gaze converges, in addition the detention of the hand to avoid the gesture of the approach. This instantaneity is achieved with an academic drawing.

In addition to these Mengs paintings, above all, he stood out for his portraits despite being one of the most complicated genres by having to reflect both the physical appearance of the character and its vital moment, capturing expression and forms at the same time. Examples of these portraits are the portrait of Winckelmann or the portrait of Nicolás de Azara, although little by little Mengs was adopting minimum but explicit concessions related to Spanish painting in her portrait production, as in the portrait of the Duchess of Medinaceli, where she breakscompletely with baroque paint. Despite this, its greatest contribution in Spain was the teaching and the administrative elements that it introduced into it.

In addition, there are a number of painters who try to adapt to that academic spirit, for example, the González Velázquez family, painters who formed in the late Baroque. One of his works is the allegory of Fernando IV, in which Carlos III appears in a basement, with a classic temple behind, accompanied by the figures of Minerva and the Muses. These are issues with which Spanish painting is not familiar and are cold. Another of these artists is Francisco Bayeu, whom Goya must much. Make paintings even in the way of the late Baroque, they do not even have the emotion of the 17th century painting. For example the appearance of the Virgin to San Julián. Then there were younger painters, contemporaries to Goya, such as Ramón Bayeu. Another painter is Gregorio Ferro, Pintor Gallego, who approves when Goya suspends in the academy. He performs works such as San Bernardo’s vision, cold paintings, without any religious emotion.

What Goya is, how he collects it and how he creates: from the beginning to his entry into the real factory

When Goya is born in Spain Fernando VI;When he dies, Fernando VII is the one who occupies the throne. Meanwhile, Carlos III and Carlos IV have reigned, the enlightened movement has received a strong impulse, although not defining, the opposition between the Church and the aristocracy, on the one hand, and the enlightened, on the other, has intensified. The War of Independence has exploded, the Constitution of 1812, the Constitution of Cádiz, has been proclaimed, the absolutism abolished, the Inquisition abolished, which is again in force since 1814. Absolutism falls with the uprising of General Rafael de Riego, liberalism is established, the Constitution of 1812. The Inquisition disappears again, Spanish colonies are lost in South America. The French army of the Duke of Angulema reinstates absolutism again, Goya marches to France, repression of liberals, Masons returns. Goya’s painting will not be foreign to all these changes.

It is said of Goya that he is the first contemporary author because he creates romanticism, realism, impressionism for authors such as Courbet and Delacroix to name them. Does not create the transitory values of the movements but the permanent values of that movements. It does so revealing the mystery of color, doing it more or less as the Greco did, by exalting color because the color that is a pictorial element, as important as the line, which does not consist of adding hue but consists in giving life to color to colorsame, create a volume without the need for the line.

When talking about Goya’s painting, several terms mustwho sees and only judges from individuality, for example, his way of looking at the war event is not resolved in great battles, but represents the incidence of war on the ordinary people. But at the same time, there is a contradiction: Goya is the son of his time and as such he wants added honors, but does not adapt to the established forms.

He was never an early painter. He had some artistic notions because his father was a gilder in Zaragoza, but he really entered the Luzán painting workshop (known for being Goya’s first teacher) at thirteen, age considered late to start painting. Goya does not paint, that is, it does not use the color for a narrative, but the color gives life to a painting. It is not known very well what Goya learned from his teacher because there is no deep footprint. Goya’s first paintings are decorative. In the workshop he came into contact with the other disciples among which was Ramón Bayeu.

Goya ends learning with seventeen years and, as is a man of his time, he wants. Goya failed twice, in 1764 and 1766. He failed because he reached a contest where the neoclassical ideal was fundamental. The first time Gregorio Ferro won and the second time Ramón Bayeu, who had been fellowight of his in Zaragoza and already had his older brother Francisco Bayeu in the court of Madrid.

Goya decides to leave for Italy by self-financing the trip, passing through Rome, Bologna, Naples, Parma … etc. This trip can be rebuilt thanks to what has been called the "Italian Notebook", where he wrote down and drawing relevant aspects of his trip. In his stay in Parma he sees in the official bulletin that an academy contest is convened, so the prize is presented and does not obtain, but a specific mention called Accésit, and therefore successful. When he returns to Zaragoza, therefore, he is commissioned by the first paintings. The theme was historic: Aníbal passing the Alps (Image 17).

Goya travels the cities, observing the works. You do not have the obligation to make sketches, it is completely free. There is a whole visual teaching flow that in the grounds of his training that is very important and he interprets it in his own way.

When Zaragoza returns to his first official work in Spain given the success in Parma in the Corete of the Basilica of Pilar de Zaragoza. What paints is the worship of the name of Jesus (image 18) where, compared to Tiépolo and Mengs, it is a traditional, weak painting, which does not attract attention in the grandiosity of the Basilica. Everything suggests that this fresh paints wanting to satisfy Francisco Bayeu in the Court, because it uses baroque machinery, whose greatest merit is in color. This fresco is also known as the glory, and one of the data that demonstrates the artist’s great mastery when doing so was that he liked it so much that he was not sent to be given the approved to Madrid. In addition, one of the aspects so that the work enjoys great importance is because it represents one of its first great commissions, having represented all the influences that it had received since its beginning on the artistic path, and leaving patent the pictorial aspects that will mark theirsubsequent representations. This means that, when this painting ends, in Zaragoza the history of the Virgin for the Cadruja dei is responsible, where the chapter room is decorated with appailed and great paintings that narrate scenes of the life of the Virgin.

Goya entrance to the Royal Tapestry Factory: First stage.

Time passes and Francisco Bayeu wants to bring his brother Ramón to Madrid, Goya’s fare. To hide and not be accused of despotism asks that young painters come for the Royal Tapestry Factory of Santa Barbara, proposing among them their brother Ramón and Goya. This is very important since Goya’s landing is in Madrid. Coming to Madrid meant entering an official site, for the Royal Tapestry Factory, which is now put into operation with greater importance, since it is one of the illustrated ideas, since they are means of work, learning, control from above (real property), and also cause the cartons to be made;And also that artists find a first position and at the same time do not have to buy tapestries from factories from other countries, covering the needs without expenses.

While Goya arrives at the Royal Factory, it is already underway, being the director Mengs, who carries out the country’s artistic policy. His painting has nothing to do with Goya’s. Goya wants to adapt to the environment that they demand, and that is that in the Royal Factory the painters have very little freedom: first of all for the size, since the tapestries are decorations for certain sites of the royal palaces, so you have to limit themselvesto the place where the tapestry will be;In addition, the neoclassical style.

In 1774 he moved to Madrid, linging for the first time to an official position, which means that he will be committed to the Court until the end of his days. The work of the factory divides it into two periods: the first from 1774 to 1781-82, and the second from 1786 to 1791. This means that in addition to being linked to the official one, when he is appointed painter of the king, although he does not match the dates of the second stage in the Royal Factory, some cardboard is commissioned. There is a whole evolution in the upholstery of the first era to the second, so that in the first stage the cartons are a true experiment for the painter, which serves to accommodate the academic style of Mengs and the academy itself.

For Goya, the first cardboard that has to paint was for one of the rooms of the Royal Palace, between two windows, the color being fundamental, since it is what then guides the weavers for the realization of the tapestry. But Mengs, begins to ask for decorations that are based on the flamenco painting of the seventeenth century, that is, rural, field issues, customs … These images show a sweetened vision of Spanish life, also of the humblest classes, and they are testimonyof a picturesque society that only existed in the imaginary of European travelers: they consecrated as real a topically Casticist and exotic vision.

In the Spanish case, they look at flamenco models but also in literary customs or themes, for example, in its first cardboard, the quarrel in the new sale (image 19), in 1777, a theme of Quijote, therefore it will have aplot, with the rule of the three units. The sale is one of the typical buildings of rural Spain. Goya has to paint it to please Meng and keep climbing positions. At the same time, being in a real service, sees some works by Velázquez in the real collections, such as some landscapes. The Teniers model is imposed. Despite this forced academicism, it is Goya’s personal contribution to dress the people of Madrid, in addition, the organization and positions of the characters are anti -academic. Little by little he leaves his imagination free. The two paintings that went to the sides of it were more complicated by the vertical size and the lowest space. On one side it represents fishing and the other hunting.

Then, Goya’s children’s themes, games, even portraits of popular figures, for the prince’s children’s rooms and the palace infants. In general, they want them to be scenes of children who have some exemplarity for infants, so they will be moralizing character. They are usually not too large, placed on the wall on the overpuertas. There is no model, only a children’s painting is asked. Forget academic models, create a completely undone painting. The characters adopt anti -academic postures. For example, children playing soldiers (image 20), with a well -dressed child and two at different levels than the prince. Goya does not look at the children of Murillo, rather, it represents attitudes, such as the security of the prince. Goya is slowly releasing, and Mengs still does not correct him, so he considers that he has pictorial value. There are many children’s issues where the spontaneity of actions is valued.

Little by little Goya dares to raise castizos and Madrid customs, such as the snack on the banks of Manzanares (image 21), where, in addition to having a story, the relevant thing is how he tells it, presenting, for example, the figure withA turn, being a counterpart contrary to the classic, another lying … nothing academic or sculptural. It establishes the prototype of the Goyesca woman, almost always represented in this way: Wasp waist, small head, feet in first, arm in jug … begins to put in this courtesan painting themes of habitual use, such as the maja and the embozados.

It also represents scenes of Lazarillo, such as the blind man of the guitar (image 22), is the tradition of popular romance that is being told for peoples, therefore two aspects stand out: that it is a literary theme of the Spanish picaresque novel and also thePresence of the unsightly, as the face of the blind character. Here those groups of figures that are present in the streets appear for the first time but do not represent anything about the subject that is being represented, they are as spectators, assuming color stains. Translates the literary scene to a historic. In addition, it represents state institutions such as the tobacco shelter (Image 23), which were the control posts for the sale and purchase of tobacco. Each figure has a position, reflecting that he did everything he could not do, but he did well.

As he advances in cardboard paintings he begins to experiment with the environments, in addition, everything has an exemplary character, so that the direction of the Royal Factory requested scenes so that the Court saw how are other women at their service, ofso that the next work was in the Queen’s Cabinet. The cardboard that is discussed is of the laundries (image 24), important since it paints a subject not suitable for a queen or a library, putting the queen that women with their effort did all the palace services andThey were almost invisible to the society of the time. Break with academic norms: color exaltation, touch qualities, vulgar theme, women’s postures, a technique with which the skirts are treated (spots where the color invades everything).

With this type of merits it is called from Zaragoza to paint again in the basilica of the Pilar a larger composition in the dome, where the Virgin is represented as queen of angels and the martyrs: the regina Martyrium, whichIt implies a step back, since it does not feel comfortable in large wall compositions since it cannot popularize them.

The second stage at the Royal Tapestry Factory

Goya begins to make the tapestries commissioned by Carlos III for the Palacio gala dining room, the four paintings of the four stations. Here the model is no longer Velázquez, but the flamenco and Dutch painting of the seventeenth century, in a game between Rembrandt and Hans, with a daily realism with a certain accent of expression.

The first one would be winter, made in 1786, which stands out for the great mastery with which the feeling of cold has been achieved. The sky is gray, the icy wind … are qualities that Goya begins to dominate. In addition to a daily representation, it has a social nuance: three peasants return covered with their blankets of what looks like an unsuccessful attempt to buy a pig, because they go empty and with umbrella looks due to cold and hunger. Two other better dresses, probable servants of a rich house, load with a huge open pig on channel. It is the time of La Matanza.

The second would be spring, which has a little gallant scene, that is, when Goya makes field scenes with figures there is always a condition that brings him closer to Rococó painting. Highlights the gallant gesture of the flower and the blunt bottom without hard lines, with a great game of light and color. The hare is a symbol of fertility so it is associated with spring. You want to see an appointment to Las Meninas in the kneeling young and inclined towards women, you can also refer to the issue of the offering to flora.

With the third of these cartons, summer or era, it can be seen that another characteristics of the second stage in the factory is that Goya is already in the enlightened environment, realizing that the enlightened have social concerns, that is,They intend agrarian, social reforms … because they understand that if power gives them that possibility, the people will be faithful. Therefore, Goya tries to place workers or people from the field in his works. In the landscape the composition contracts, on the other hand, attitudes are very carefree and popular. The scene represents several reays resting in a lot of freshly harvested wheat sheaves with their families, between happy conversations, hobbies, children’s games and a glass of wine. Some continue their hard work, such as the figure on the right, while on the left a group of peasants tries. In a relaxed and warmly bathed at a yellow radiant that does not leave without illuminating any face, expression or attitude, while granting density to the color of the straw and clarifies and gives depth to the tones of the sky, sweeting everything, even the rigidCastle architecture. Away from the canons of traditional iconography, Goya embodied a summer very different from the classic representation of a young spike. It is important to highlight from this tapestry that in the Lázaro Galdiano Museum they retain a sketch of it, which Goya could do to himself and to have a memory of the images he carried out. On the other hand, in the last of these cartons, autumn or harvest, you can see a Velazqueño landscape.

In this second stage in the factory there is no continuity of orders but Goya is delivering cartons as needed by choosing the type of cardboard you want, the subject … etc. We see greater pictorial wisdom therefore. In this way, within the production of cartons of this second stage we see certain constants between some cartons and others, such as that these cartons are made in such a way that they even look like paintings, having a very rich chromatic range compared to the firstcartons that also made in them how the line is practically undone. Thus, little by little these cartons will acquire greater classicism in the structure, such as with the pyramidal composition. Something that attracts attention in Goya is its tendency to represent fewer and fewer figures or a single figure, except exceptions, and always poor figures, such as in the dulzainero or the poor of the fountain. These figures represented increasingIt is theatrical. In addition, as is immersed in the culture of illustration, there is an architectural space that supports the figures or contains them in a plane, providing solidity to the scenes. Finally, it highlights the way in which it begins to introduce castiza customs, so it also begins to make a criticism, although still subtle, of corruptions and customs.

It also represents others of a more social nature such as the injured mason, a work in which José Ortega y Gasset is fixed in the study that makes Goya to say that a decree of Carlos III commemorates that forces scaffolding in the high buildings in the buildings. Along with this, Goya does other issues such as the blind hen, in 1787, demonstrating the painter’s breadth. It is a gallant painting with details.

Latest upholstery and final context

But at the end of 1788, exactly on December 14, Carlos III dies and the manufacture of the tapestries destined for the El Pardo Palace is paralyzed, although a year later he goes up to the throne Carlos IV with María Luisa, change that benefits Goya, andthat Carlos IV being Prince he knew Goya perfectly, naming him at this time first camera painter and then advisor to the Royal Academy, which shows that Goya is ascending category. The first thing to do as the first camera painter is the portraits of the new kings, in addition to the decoration of the Palacio del Escorial, commissioned by María Luisa.

These new tapestries that are going to decorate the aforementioned palace rooms will deal with country and jocular things, which is what the king wanted, so the order of Francisco Bayeu and Maella to communicate to Goya, so that in the beginningof 1792 will carry out seven tapestries for the king’s office, although at first they should be twelve. These seven tapestries are: the girls of the pitcher, the pellele, the wedding, the stilts, the gigantillas, boys climbing a tree and the rocker. At the wedding he makes a very clear criticism of the church traps, exactly to the marriage of convenience: the lady of the people who will be married to the fool of the town is represented, which is rich, which is shown in the faces. It also highlights the gossip of the women of the town and the different expressions. This is the last round of tapestries that Goya performs, characterized by those diaphanous, jocular and fun with a certain halo of mystery in them, favored by the strange architectural structures in some of the cartons.

In the 90s, fundamental in the history of Spain. There is a protagonist here, Manuel Godoy, Carlos IV’s minister and the central figure, controversy. Fernando VII is also conflictive, so it causes Godoy. This decade is marked by what the French Revolution was and the execution of Louis XVI and Mará Antonieta, so as the Court sees that can happen creates a tension situation in case in Spain, increasing with Napoleon. We must take into account both Godoy’s ambition, and the whim of the Queen, the softness of Carlos IV and the situation of France, which Spain lives very directly. It must be borne in mind that Carlos IV hereda of Carlos III both the throne and Godoy and Floridablanca, displaced by the first. Godoy had a lotNobles, so he is dismissed, but in 1802 he returns and is no longer liberal, turning a tyrant. This time is the so -called "illustrated spring", a stage where there was the hope of a liberal regime, of a European draft monarchy.