Unit 11 - Project reflections

Project 11 - The project involved taking an 18th centuty painting that depicts an event and analysing how the event has been portrayed. 

I chose Goya's Third of May 1808.  I started by looking into the history and story behind the event depicted and found out that this is one of a pair of paintings.  (It is thought possible that there were in fact 4 or more paintings in the series but the others have been lost.)

I then looked into Goya's depiction of events.  Other Spaniard's painting similar events portrayed their countrymen as heroes wheras Goya decided to depict them as matrys.  He showed the true events of 100s of rebels being shot by the French troops before dawn following their uprising in Madrid.  His stark method of showing the corpse, the next victim and those waiting in line forces the viewer to think about the numbers involved and the effects of the event. 

At the time Goya's picture was not exhibited as it was thought to be too brutal and unusual. 

I enjoyed this project as it was interesting to find out more detail of the story behind the painting and to maek myself thing about the way that the artist has chosen to depict the event.