Unhappy mother! (Madre infeliz!), number 50 of 80; from the series The Disasters of War (Los Desastres de la Guerra)

Francisco Jose de Goya y Lucientes, Spanish, 1746 - 1828

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1810-1820

Etching, aquatint and scraping on paper

First edition, made prior to all corrections

Plate: 6 1/8 × 8 1/16 in. (15.5 × 20.4 cm)

Sheet: 9 9/16 × 12 13/16 in. (24.3 × 32.6 cm)

Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth: Gift of Adolph Weil Jr., Class of 1935

PR.991.50.1.50

Publisher

Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando, Madrid, Spain

Geography

Place Made: Spain, Europe

Period

19th century

Object Name

Print

Research Area

Print

Not on view

Inscriptions

Inscribed, in plate, lower center: Madre infelix!; inscribed, in plate, upper left: 50; inscribed, in graphite, upper left: 50; inscribed, in graphite, upper right: 50 Watermark: HGO/Palmette

Label

The disasters of war occur not only to the soldiers fighting and their direct victims, but also to the survivors and witnesses of the conflict’s immediate aftermath. In these prints, Goya depicts moments of sorrow as well as cruelty. Goya suggest that looking upon war can be its own torture: Looking over a pile of dead bodies, a man in Plate 12 can only vomit. In Plate 26, huddled men and women shrink away from advancing bayonets, anticipating their deaths. A child is left orphaned in Plate 50, crying as she follows the men who cart her mother’s body away. Ravaged by fighting, Spain suffered severe famine, represented in Plate 61. Upon seeing their skeletal countryman, two rich men instead turn their backs. The visceral reactions upon seeing horror that these images represent seem intended to provoke a similar response in the viewer.

From the 2023 exhibition Recording War: Images of Violence 1500 – 1900, curated by Elizabeth Rice Mattison, Andrew W. Mellon Associate Curator of Academic Programming

Course History

FILM 47, From The Fall of the Wall to 9-11: Understanding the New World Disorder, Mark Williams, James Nachtwey, Spring 2013

Spanish 31.01, Introduction to Hispanic Literature II, Sebastian Diaz, Winter 2023

Anthropology 3.01, Introduction to Anthropology, Charis Ford Morrison Boke 1, Summer 2023

Studio Art 27.01/28.01/74.01, Printmaking I/II/III, Josh Dannin, Summer 2024

Exhibition History

Fatal Consequences: Callot, Goya, and the Horrors of Wars, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hamsphire, September 8-December 9, 1990.

Fred Wilson, So Much Trouble in the World - Believe It or Not!, William B. Jaffe and Evelyn A. Jaffe Hall Galleries, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, October 4-December 11, 2005.

Recording War: Images of Violence, 1500-1900, Ivan Albright Gallery, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, August 23-December 9, 2023.

Publication History

Timothy Rub, Egbert Haverkamp-Begemann, Kelly Pask, "A Gift to the College: The Mr. and Mrs. Adolph Weil Jr. Collection of Master Prints", Hanover, New Hampshire: Trustees of Dartmouth College, 1998, listed, p.99, no. 151.

Hilliard T. Goldfarb and Reva Wolf, Fatal Consequences: Callot, Goya, and the Horrors of War, Hanover, New Hampshire: Trustees of Dartmouth College, 1990.

Barbara Thompson, Fred Wilson, So Much Trouble in the World - Believe It or Not!, Hanover, New Hampshire: Trustees of Dartmouth College, 2005.

Provenance

Date unknown, in the collection of Felix Somary (1881-1956), Vienna and Zurich; sold Sotheby's, New York, May 3, 1978, lot 2; purchased by Adolph Weil, Jr., Montgomery, Alabama; 1991 given to Dartmouth College by Adolph Weil, Jr., Class of 1935.

Catalogue Raisonne

Delteil 169; Harris 170

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