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After vice comes fornication (Tras el vivio viene el fornicio), Plate 4 of Los Disparates
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After vice comes fornication (Tras el vivio viene el fornicio), Plate 4 of Los Disparates Etched about 1819 - 1823 (published 1864)
Unlike Goya’s other series of prints, Los Disparates were not directed against a particular social or political evil, but were largely pessimistic comments on human life in general - its follies and absurdities. This strange image possibly alludes to the idea that if we could see our vices, they would be ugly and terrifying to us. In the foreground a petrified man cowers behind a woman who is scared rigid. The large figure towering over them is smiling and playing the castanets, looking foolish and vulgar. He is accompanied by nightmarish howling creatures and perhaps represents a personification of the couple’s own vice and depravity.

Glossary Open

Drypoint

A printmaking technique that uses a needle to etch an image directly onto a copper plate. The resulting raised surface, or burr, which holds the ink used in the printmaking process produces a soft, velvety effect.

Etching

A form of printmaking in which a metal plate is covered with a substance called a 'ground', usually wax, into which an image is drawn with a needle. Acid is applied, eroding the areas of the plate exposed but not the areas covered by wax. The action of the acid creates lines in the metal plate that hold the ink from which a print is made when the plate is pressed against paper under pressure.

Personification

The depiction of an animal or an inanimate object with human characteristics.

Print

An image pressed or stamped onto paper or fabric. This encompasses a wide variety of techniques, usually produced in multiples, although one-off prints, known as monoprints, are also included. The term is also applied to photographic images.

Drypoint, Etching, Personification, Print

Details

  • Acc. No. GOYA.83
  • Medium Etching, burnished aquatint, burin and drypoint (?) on paper
  • Size 24.50 x 35.00 cm
  • Credit Purchased 1959

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