Plate 22 from "Los Caprichos": Poor little girls! (Pobrecitas!)
Medium
Etching, burnished aquatint
Dimensions
Plate: 8 7/16 x 5 7/8 in. (21.5 x 14.9 cm) Sheet: 11 5/8 x 8 1/4 in. (29.5 x 21 cm)
Classification
Prints
Department
Drawings and Prints
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Gift of M. Knoedler & Co., 1918
Accession Number
18.64(22)
Tags
Art Historical Context
In Francisco de Goya's *Los Caprichos*, Plate 22, titled *Poor little girls! (Precitas!)* (1799), captures a poignant moment of societal folly and human vulnerability. Created amid Spain's Enlightenment-era tensions and Goya's growing disillusionment with corruption, superstition, and moral decay, this print depicts two young girls in the company of an older man evoking sympathy for their innocence amid implied exploitation—likely a critique of prostitution and the plight of the impoverished underclass. The bilingual title underscores Goya's satirical bite, blending pathos with condemnation of...
About the Artist
Goya (Francisco de Goya y Lucientes) · 1746–1828
Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes (1746-1828) was a Spanish painter and printmaker considered the last of the Old Masters and the first of the moderns. Rising from modest provincial origins to become First Court Painter to Charles IV, Goya's career spanned the Enlightenment's optimism and the brutal Napoleonic invasion that shattered it. A mysterious illness in 1793 left him permanently deaf and ...