FRANCISCO DE GOYA Y LUCIENTES (1746-1828), There they go plucked (Ya van desplumados) Plate 20 from: Los Caprichos

FRANCISCO DE GOYA Y LUCIENTES (1746-1828)
There they go plucked (Ya van desplumados)
Plate 20 from: Los Caprichos
etching with burnished aquatint, drypoint and engraving, on laid paper, a good impression from the First Edition, published by the artist, Madrid, 1799, before the dark background begins to wear, framed
Plate: 8³⁄₈ x 5⁷⁄₈ in. (213 x 149 mm.)
Sheet: 11³⁄₄ x 8 in. (298 x 203 mm.)

Presumably Manuel Fernández Durán y Pando, Marqués de Perales del Río (1818-1886), Madrid.
Don Pedro Fernández-Durán (1846-1930), Madrid; with his stamp (Lugt 747b); presumably by descent from the above.
Don Tomas de la Maza y Saavedra (1896-1975); gift from the above.
With Herman Shickman Fine Arts, New York.
With Stuart Denenberg, Los Angeles.
Private American Collection; acquired from the above.

Delteil 57; Harris 55

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Lot Essay

‘A number of commentators have noted the double-meaning of the word deplumar: to be fleeced (of their money) but also to be plucked (of their manhood)…Baldness being associated with syphilis, the subject of this work goes back to the idea of deplu as being ‘plucked’ and is a reference to what Goya and his more contemporaries felt to be the generally low morality of the times and one of its results. Finally, this etching could also be seen as an attack against the clergy and its participation in the low morality of the times. The apparently approving figures in the background could be taken as monks with the one on the right with his rosary on his belt.’

Johnson, R. S., Francisco Goya, Los Caprichos, R.S. Johnson Fine Art, Chicago, 1992, p. 66.