Weeping Woman and Three Men

A weeping woman takes centre stage in this drawing, with Goya adding extra detail to her dress and depicting her in a state of great distress and sadness, whilst several men supplement the scene in supporting her.

Note the elegant clothing but fairly casual scene - this was typical of this series of drawings that Goya completed as a result of running low on his painting materials. The artist provides us with a personal viewpoint of dukes and duchesses, plus their close family members, that most would not have seen. The was a part of a sketchbook which was later separated into individual leaves by Goya's son, Xavier. He would then create a new system of documenting them as his father had not done so effectively with his collections of drawings.

Xavier's decision to bring a better documentation of his father's work across this series of sketchbooks was purely from the point of view of selling them on. He knew that individually they would be easier to display and sell, also reaching a larger overall price. As Francesco moved around he tended to leave artworks behind, some of which his son would claim for himself and sell on with his father's best wishes.

To gauge a quick understanding of how varied artistic styles became from the 20th century and onwards, we can compare these beautiful figurative sketches from Goya with the Cubist approach of his countryman - Pablo Picasso. That genius' own Weeping Woman continues to amaze with its boldness and bright colour, taking a similar theme to this of Goya but delivering a completely different finish.