Francisco Goya
Francisco Goya (1746-1828), Spanish painter and etcher, whose work had a profound influence on 19th-century French painting. His cartoons for the royal tapestry factory and his lively portraits won the king’s approval, and he became a court painter in 1789. In 1792 a severe illness made him deaf, and his work became increasingly personal and original. The etchings Los Caprichos (1793-98) satirize the Church, while the macabre series of etchings The Disasters of War (1810-14) and the paintings 2 May and 3 May 1808 (1814) record the atrocities committed by French troops when Napoleon invaded Spain. Goya visited Paris in 1824 and then settled in Bordeaux, where he died.
