Furthermore, the ideal was not in his line; the dominant note of his talent, before all else, was naturalism. Genre painter by temperament, he sought by preference for the picturesque aspect of his subjects. Owing to these conditions, his frescoes at Saragossa and in general all his large religious compositions are in reality nothing else than vast genre paintings.
THE GLORIOUS PERIOD
At the same time that he was painting his frescoes and his scenes of popular life, Goya also tried his skill at portraiture. In this branch of his art his success was immediate and complete. From his very first attempts he attained the highest possible reputation. From morning till night he saw his studio besieged by all the most distinguished figures in the society of the Court and the city. It soon became the fashion, the rage, to have oneself painted by Goya. They stood in line at his door; they brought all sorts of influence to bear to obtain the favour of a sitting. All the celebrities of the period, poets, scientists, political luminaries, equally with ladies of rank and reigning beauties, succumbed to this unheard-of vogue, which persisted, we may add, to the very end of the master’s long career. Furthermore, his portraits form the most extensive part of his life-work, and at the same time the part which is the most indisputable and the most perfect.
PLATE VI.—KING CHARLES IV AND HIS FAMILY
(Museum of the Prado, Madrid)
Goya was the favourite painter of the king Charles IV, who conferred upon him the title of First Painter. In this fine painting, which raised the reputation of the artist to its zenith, the members of the royal family are admirably and sincerely rendered, without a trace of flattery. All the degeneracy of the dynasty is to be read in these countenances, in terms of convincing eloquence.
There are nearly two hundred portraits that are known to have been painted by Goya. They are not all of equal value, and in some of them we feel a certain degree of carelessness of execution, which is to be explained by the rapid workmanship demanded of him by the abundance of his orders. But however hasty the work may be, there are always to be found in it the essential qualities of this artist: a surety of expression, a free yet firm outline, and an incredible understanding of his model’s personality. Goya did not trouble himself to embellish his patrons, for he was no flatterer; if the man or woman who posed before him was homely, Goya’s pencil would do nothing towards correcting the injustices of nature. That was not his business; but he was able, with an unsurpassed clearness of vision, to catch upon his canvas that flashing glance, that fugitive gleam of the inner soul which, at some precise moment, is sure to transfigure the most unlovely features. What distinguished him above all else was his originality, that purely personal stamp, thanks to which it is impossible not to recognize a Goya from the first instant. There is in him something that he shares in common with all the great portraitists, and yet he resembles no one of them. He is Goya.
In the portraits painted in costume, now to be seen in the museum at Madrid, he somewhat approached the manner of Velazquez; under this class might be mentioned the portraits of the Infante Don Luis and his family, that of the Count of Florida-Blanca, of the Duchess of Alba, and of General Urrutia, which is a magnificent masterpiece. All these portraits possess distinction, bold relief, and a lofty carriage which recalls the free and noble manner of the painter of Philip IV.
At other times his brush took on a milder manner, shading off into soft and vaporous tints that set us thinking of Reynolds and of Prudhon, especially in those intimate portraits into which he has put the greatest spontaneity. In this class belong the admirable Young Man in Gray, the painter’s grandson—this portrait is certainly one of the most beautiful of all Goya’s works—and the famous portraits of Moratin, Boyeu, Josefa Bayeu, the architect Villanueva, and the two Majas, both the nude and the clothed, which are said to be portraits of the Duchess of Alba, taken in the same pose but under two different aspects. We may also include among the works of his second manner the two portraits of woman which hang in the Louvre; The Woman with the Fan, which is reproduced in the present volume, and the Portrait of a Young Woman, which, together with the Ferdinand Guillemardet, are the only paintings by Goya which France’s chief national museum possesses.