Plate 18 of "La 'Tauromaquia": The daring of Martincho in the ring at Zaragoza
Goya (Francisco de Goya y Lucientes) Spanish
Not on view
This print shows the heart-stopping antics of Martincho (Antonio Ebassun), a bullfighter active in the second half of the eighteenth century. Goya devoted four Tauromaquia plates and one unpublished print to this otherwise obscure matador. Here, he sits on a chair with his feet shackled, confronting the charging animal. The matador’s sword is echoed visually by the strip of burnished aquatint that follows a roughly horizontal path and demarcates two tonal sections. The mass of dark shading below—narrowing like an arrow as it nears the bull—intensifies the focus on man and beast, underscoring the power of the thrust, and prefigures their ultimately deadly clash.
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