From Library Journal

The tempestuous works of Spanish painter Francisco Goya (b.1746) set him far apart from his European contemporaries. He is best known for his ability to get away with subtly mocking the bourgeoisie, something most brilliantly accomplished in his notorious "Family of Charles V." The painter was a witness to the ferociously bloody resistance by the Spanish during France's occupation, which greatly influenced his work, and he was also afflicted by an illness that robbed him of his hearing. Goya went on to produce some of the most grotesque, capricious, and chilling images in the history of Western art with his "Black Paintings" series. This well-structured book includes hundreds of cropped and full-framed color reproductions of Goya's oeuvre. In the highly analytical text, Licht, curator for the Peggy Guggenheim collection in Venice, investigates and contextualizes specific eras of the artist's life, ranging from the satirical graphic art of "The Caprichos" to his group portraits, his tapestries, religious paintings, and eventually the "Black Paintings." In his section on the Majas (self-assured Madrilene ladies), Licht disputes the widespread speculation that the woman depicted in Goya's most scandalous paintings, "The Naked Maja" and "The Clothed Maja," was not society lady the Marquesa de Alba (with whom Goya has also been romantically linked) but rather an unknown woman. Licht's ability to see Goya's life and works from the contemporary perspective of modern art and culture, rather than from that of a classic art historian or technical observer, makes for a psychoanalytical and insightful study. Recommended for libraries with large collections on European painters. Adriana Lopez, "Cr¡ticas"

Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Review

"...a refreshing corrective. His erudition is rich and allusive. He looks minutely at the pictures, his argument is arresting." -- V. S. Pritchett, The New Yorker

"...casts dazzling light not only on Goya, but also on the entire history of modern art and culture." -- Robert Rosenblum, Professor of Modern European Art, New York University

"A brilliant book... filled with new observations and striking analogies." -- Sir John Pope-Hennessy, late Consultative Chairman, European Paintings, The Metropolitan Museum of Art

"The most brilliant, far ranging, and profound study of this fascinating artist that I have ever read." -- Linda Nochlin, Lila Acheson Wallace Professor of Modern Art at New York University's Institute of Fine Arts