Romanticism1814
The Third of May 1808
Francisco Goya
Curator's Eye
"The Christ-like man in white, the faceless execution squad, and the cubic lantern casting a harsh light on the drama."
The inaugural manifesto of modern painting, where Goya transforms a historical massacre into a universal icon of resistance and the horror of war.
Analysis
Painted in 1814, "The Third of May 1808" commemorates the summary executions carried out by Napoleonic troops in Madrid. The historical context is the Spanish War of Independence, triggered by the uprising of the Dos de Mayo. Goya does not paint a victory, but the sacrifice of anonymous citizens. The style breaks with Neoclassical heroism; here, there is no nobility in death, but rather an industrial slaughter. The psychology of the work pits the individual terror of the condemned — from prayer to defiance — against the mechanical indifference of the firing squad.
Goya's technique is revolutionary. He abandons academic finish for broad, impetuous, almost expressionistic strokes ahead of his time. The paint is thick, and the blood reds are worked with a crudity that shocked his contemporaries. Historically, the work acts as a national exorcism, a request by Goya to reaffirm his loyalty to the restored monarchy after serving under the French administration. It is a meditation on the end of the Enlightenment, where reason, by engendering technological warfare, has produced monsters.
The mythological context is here diverted toward secularized Christian iconography. The central character, in his blindingly white shirt, adopts the pose of Christ on the cross (stigmata are indeed visible on his palms). Goya replaces the divine with the human; martyrdom is no longer religious but political. This "religion of humanity" makes every insurgent a sacred being facing the state machine. The explanation of the story lies in this shift: the passage from the sacred to the political, where suffering becomes the engine of national identity.
Finally, the deep analysis reveals a work of spatial rupture. The background, with the church of San Francisco el Grande plunged into darkness, symbolizes the impotence of religion and institutions in the face of barbarism. The ground is littered with corpses already decomposing, a vision of death without hope of resurrection. Goya does not seek to please; he seeks to witness human "desolation," thus creating the first great cry of protest in Western art history.
Recent X-ray analyses have revealed that Goya painted the work with lightning speed, with almost no pentimenti, confirming the emotional urgency of the subject. Contrary to legend, Goya did not directly witness the massacre but gathered testimonies to construct a scene of "augmented truth." A little-known secret lies in the lantern: it is the only source of artificial light, symbolizing not the knowledge of the Enlightenment, but the instrument of surveillance and death, guiding bullets toward hearts.
A mystery also surrounds the commission of the painting. Although the provisional government funded the work, the new King Ferdinand VII did not appreciate it much, finding it too dark and unflattering for the crown. The painting remained in the Prado's storage for decades before being recognized as a masterpiece. Pigment studies have shown the use of Spanish earth mixed with cochineal red lacquers, physically anchoring the work in Madrid soil.
An intriguing scientific anecdote concerns the right hand of the man in white: a small scar is painted there, evoking a stigma. This was a deliberate decision by Goya to sanctify the peasant. Furthermore, the uniforms of the French soldiers were painted with documentary precision, allowing today for the identification of the imperial army corps present that night, reinforcing the painting's character as a visual investigative report.
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What color is the shirt of the central figure who raises his arms in front of the firing squad?
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