And there's no help for it, plate 15 from The Disasters of War
1810/11, published 1863
Medium
Etching, drypoint, burin, and burnishing on ivory wove paper with gilt edges
Dimensions
Image: 12.9 × 15.5 cm (5 1/8 × 6 1/8 in.); Plate: 14 × 16.9 cm (5 9/16 × 6 11/16 in.); Sheet: 24 × 34 cm (9 1/2 × 13 7/16 in.)
Classification
etching
Department
Prints and Drawings
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
124858
Rights
Public Domain
About this artwork
In this etching a line of tied-up victims is executed one by one by a faceless firing squad. The tips of gun barrels emerge from the far right, capturing the moment immediately preceding the spray of bullets that will kill the central figure. At his feet lies the mangled corpse of an earlier victim.
About the Artist
Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes · 1746–1828
Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes was born on March 30, 1746, in the small Aragonese village of Fuendetodos, Spain, to José Benito de Goya, a master gilder, and Gracia de Lucientes. The fourth of six children in a modest lower-middle-class family, Goya received a basic education before beginning his artistic training at age 14 under the local painter José Luzán y Martínez in Zaragoza, where he sp...