Goya's The Junta of the Philippines

Goya's The Junta of the Philippines (1815) at the Goya Museum at Castres is the largest work the artist ever painted (327 x 417 cm). The painting depicts the Spanish king, Ferdinand VII, presiding over a meeting of the Real Compa�fa de Filipinas [Royal Company of the Philippines], a publicly-held trading company. Once the subject has been identified, however, the work remains strikingly unusual. The painting features a group of men seated at a raised table who face a room in which, on either side of a broad expanse of carpet, two groups of men face each other, ranged in rows of chairs. Another man stands at the left, in the doorway to the room. The painting is remarkably difficult to read because the solemn air of the Junta (or board of directors) at the high table contrasts with the variety of types of men in the chairs who, for the most part, seem to exhibit 40 different kinds of boredom and inattention. Art historians, lacking much information about the picture, tended to claim that the mystery is an intrinsic part of the work. But, as scholars assemble more information about the circumstances depicted and the reasons for the commission, the mystery tends to fade and the painting gains focus as a sharp comment on historic circumstances that go far beyond the confines of this strange room.

Licht held that the action of the painting was "unfathomable" and stated that it was "hardly plausible" that this was a history painting which "aim[ed] at illustrating a partic

illion shares to set an example for those individuals "whose capital was idle or relatively unproductive." The company succeeded at first and by 1806, when sales had dropped off somewhat, it was still considered very much a viable enterprise and its capital stock was expanded to 12,500,000 pesos, with Carlos IV holding nearly a quarter of that amount. But the Napoleonic wars intervened and the company did little business for many years. The meeting of March 30 1815 depicted by Goya was, in fact, their first since the War of Independence. The War of Independence, so-called, was also responsible for the return of Ferdinand VII to Spain. His father, Carlos IV had abdicated under pressure from Napoleon in 1808 and had gone into exile in France and Italy. Ferdinand was exiled to the estate of the diplomat Talleyrand at Valentay and spent five years there. During his exile Ferdinand made no attempt to escape and even expressed his loyalty to Joseph I, Napoleon's brother, who had been set up as king of Spain. But in Spain, where the miserable populace was suffering through the War of Independence, Ferdinand was known as "the desired one," the great hope for the return to normalcy. In 1813 Napoleon was in a terrible position

Category: Arts - G