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Plate 55 from "Los Caprichos": Until death (Hasta la muerte)

1799
Not on view
The figure at the center has been variously identified as a vain woman getting ready to celebrate her seventy-fifth birthday or a representation of death itself. She sits at the mirror in her boudoir, trying on a new headpiece, while her maid and two young men—possibly her professed admirers—conceal their sneering. The image shares the tone and concerns of the social satires that appear earlier in the series. Its position might be explained by the old woman’s physical appearance; the artist often used features meant to be read as grotesque to imply moral conditions. The mild caricatures of the first part of the Caprichos yield in the second part to witches, monsters, and barely human clerics.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: Plate 55 from "Los Caprichos": Until death (Hasta la muerte)
  • Series/Portfolio: Los Caprichos
  • Artist: Goya (Francisco de Goya y Lucientes) (Spanish, Fuendetodos 1746–1828 Bordeaux)
  • Date: 1799
  • Medium: Etching, burnished aquatint, drypoint
  • Dimensions: Plate: 8 3/8 × 5 15/16 in. (21.3 × 15.1 cm)
    Sheet: 11 5/8 × 8 1/4 in. (29.5 × 21 cm)
  • Classification: Prints
  • Credit Line: Gift of M. Knoedler & Co., 1918
  • Object Number: 18.64(55)
  • Curatorial Department: Drawings and Prints

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Plate 22 from 'Los Caprichos': Poor little girls! (Probrecitas!), Goya (Francisco de Goya y Lucientes) Spanish, Etching, burnished aquatint
Plate 22 from 'Los Caprichos': Poor little girls! (Probrecitas!)
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1799, posthumous impression
'Folly of Fear' from the 'Disparates' (Follies / Irrationalities), Goya (Francisco de Goya y Lucientes) Spanish, Etching, burnished aquatint, drypoint
'Folly of Fear' from the 'Disparates' (Follies / Irrationalities)
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ca. 1815–19 (published 1864)
'Clear Folly' from the 'Disparates' (Follies / Irrationalities), Goya (Francisco de Goya y Lucientes) Spanish, Etching, burnished aquatint
'Clear Folly' from the 'Disparates' (Follies / Irrationalities)
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'Carnival Folly' from the 'Disparates' (Follies / Irrationalities), Goya (Francisco de Goya y Lucientes) Spanish, Etching, aquatint
'Carnival Folly' from the 'Disparates' (Follies / Irrationalities)
Goya (Francisco de Goya y Lucientes)
ca. 1815–19 (published 1864)
'Flying Folly' from the 'Disparates' (Follies / Irrationalities), Goya (Francisco de Goya y Lucientes) Spanish, Etching, aquatint
'Flying Folly' from the 'Disparates' (Follies / Irrationalities)
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ca. 1815–19 (published 1864)

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