Goya's Third of May 7/8/07

While visiting the Prado in Madrid, we got the chance to view many of Goya's paintings. I had never really heard of Goya before visiting the Prado. I now have a new appreciation for the artist.I even went to go pay my respect and visited his tomb on the last day of my trip. One of Goyas most famous pieces of work titled the"Third of May 1808"painted during the year of 1814. The painting is a piece of art displaying Goya's theme against war. In the painting, innocent civilians are being murdered by Napoleon's troops. Lots of interesting things went into Goya's painting for example one thing that brings your focus to the painting is a man in a white shirt with a look of horror on his face as he is about to be killed. His hands are spread out. Some say Goya did this on purpose to resemble the image of Jesus Christ being Crucified. Also, the image of the white shirt displays the innocence of the civilian. It was interesting that Goya never really showed the face of the soldiers. Perhaps this was done on purpose to illustrate that these soldiers were not human but instead killing machines. Although this painting is very popular, it is not my favorite. During Goya's later years in life, he went deaf.During this period Goya painted a different style and it was labled Goyas dark paintings. I favor these dark paintings because they are more imaginative and gruesome than Goya's early worksof painting royalty and bright colorful pictures. My favorite dark painting is labled "Saturn Devouring His Son",painted in 1819.I liked it because there was such detail in the crazed look on Saturns face and there was lots of gore in the painting. I found it interesting that Goya did not name this painting. It was named after his death by others. Im glad I visited the Prado because it introduced me to new painters that I had not heard of before and probably never would have heard of if I hadnt taken the time to visit the beautiful museum.