The director of the National Museum of Romanticism, Carolina Miguel, explained that this painting, acquired at the end of 2023 by the Ministry of Culture – for a total amount of one and a half million euros – will remain on display in the Meeting Room ( Room XXV) until next May 19.
The Mercy It is a work from the Aragonian’s youth, as Miguel has pointed out, made during the painter’s Zaragoza period, after a period of training in Roma, which joins the artist’s other canvas that stands out in the institution’s collection: Saint Gregory the Great, Pope.
Importance of the work
The founder of the museum, II Márques de la Vega-Inclán, understood that Goya was the precursor of romanticism, which is why he included the representation of Saint Gregory the Great in the rooms of the state museum since its creation 100 years ago.
In that context, The Mercy, As stated by the director of the museum: “it speaks of a very specific and very unknown period of the author.”
“Normally, later literature has related Goya, especially the last moments of his career, with the beginning of a new modernity, of a new pictorial style. However, the romantic painters, the first generation, the second generation of romantic painters , they knew the neoclassical Goya, even the Rococ Goya,” he added.
Thus, the new work exhibited by the National Museum of Romanticism had until now only participated in an exhibition held in 2015 at the Goya Museum, in the Ibercaja Collection in Zaragoza, Goya and Zaragoza (1746-1775). Its Aragonese roots. The painting, as the museum director has specified, was unveiled in 2011 in a studio by Arturo Ansn Navarro and was subjected to various technical studies at the Museo Nacional del Prado in 2013.
In this context, it was the Prado Museum, through an x-ray, that discovered an underlying drawing on the canvas. As Miguel has pointed out, The mercy It hides a hidden message, since the artist reused many canvases. “It is a full-length man, most likely a Saint Joachim, who is bearded and has an angel, located under a reddish preparation base.”
Features of The Mercy
The work, in a small format (83.5 x 58 centimeters), preserves the original canvas and frame and it is estimated that it could have been conceived for domestic devotion and commissioned by a member of the Church or the Zaragoza bourgeoisie of the last third from the 18th century.
In this way, it constitutes a representative sample of one of the themes least treated by the Aragonese painter, religious painting, like the aforementioned Saint Gregory the Great, as Miguel added during the presentation of the painting.
Goya made The Mercy in Zaragoza, after returning, in 1771, from his training trip to Italy. The influence of said stay is palpable in the painting, where the inspiration of models such as, for example, those of Carlo Maratti, Annibale Carracci or Michelangelo can be seen.
Likewise, although the figure of Jesus Christ is more reminiscent of the works of Michelangelo, according to the director of the museum, the figure of the Virgin, with the expression, looking at the sky, blue cloak and pink tunic, is reminiscent of the other paintings that the artist creates in Zaragoza.
Specifically, this is a period in which he carried out important commissions such as that of the Basilica of Nuestra Señora del Pilar or the cycle of mural paintings on the life of the Virgin of the Cartuja of Aula Dei. In those years, he also made small religious-themed paintings intended for private devotion, like this one. Piety, whose dating has been adjusted between the years 1772 and 1774.
The work presented is simple, since it is a triangular composition in which drama stands out. “It is a particularly dramatic painting that wants to contextualize the pain of the Virgin and also places the symbols of passion at the foot,” added the museum director.
Program The Museum Presents
The presentation of the painting in the Meeting Room is part of the El Museo Presenta program, an exhibition model with which the institution makes the public participate in its most recent initiatives: acquisitions, restorations or new visions of its collections.
It began its journey in 2019 with the purchase and restoration of the Portrait of Francisco Aranda by Federico de Madrazo. After several editions, more recently it served to announce another relevant acquisition for the museum by the Ministry: a case with two dueling pistols and their accessories by the prestigious gunsmith Eusebio Zuloaga.
In the case of The Mercy, It is an exhibition montage to thisat the end of the permanent tour, which allows, as the institution has indicated, to emphasize the work, delve into the context in which it was made and underline the importance of this acquisition in particular – and of Goya in general – for the National Museum of Romanticism.
100 years of romanticism
The presentation of this work by Francisco de Goya is one of the outstanding activities with which the museum invites the public to celebrate its first centenary. Precisely, in the year of its creation, 1924, as highlighted by the director of the museum, the art historian Manuel Bartolom Cosso (1857-1935) addressed a letter to its founder, the II Marquis de la Vega-Inclán.
In it, he expressed the need for the presence of the genius of Fuendetodos in the then Romantic Museum with these words: “Romantic or not, if his paintings did not open the doors of the museum, the ghosts of Goya would wander through it eternally at all hours.”
A century later, when this exhibition ends, The Mercy It will become part of its permanent exhibition, forming part of the room of this house-museum dedicated to family devotion, the Oratory. Thus, as the institution has stated: “it will contribute to completing the discourse of this room, in dialogue with the monumental Goya canvas that presides over it: Saint Gregory the Great“In fact, Cosso defined the Aragonese artist as perhaps the most glorious and original romanticist.
FUENTE: Europa Press
