Friar Pedro Shoots El Maragato as His Horse Runs Off c. 1806

Editor: Goya's "Friar Pedro Shoots El Maragato as His Horse Runs Off," painted around 1806, captures quite a dramatic scene with oil paint. I’m really struck by the rough texture and how immediate everything feels. What should we be paying attention to in this depiction? Curator: Let's consider Goya's engagement with the social and political landscape of his time. Look at the materiality of the paint, how he uses the thick impasto to create the textures of the friar's robe and the bandit's clothing. It tells us something about their roles and their status, doesn't it? The brushstrokes themselves seem to perform the action, mimicking the violence and immediacy of the event. What kind of labour went into creating this? Editor: That's interesting; I hadn’t considered how the application of the paint itself is meaningful! It's almost as if the painting is documenting not just the event, but the *making* of the event, too. Was there something particular about oil paints in that period? Curator: Exactly! And Goya’s choices challenge academic painting's more polished, illusionistic qualities, bringing forward the real work involved. Oil paint at this point was commercially produced; this meant an increasing amount of art was now a commodified object produced through developing labor structures and trade. How might the conditions under which Goya was working, the materials at his disposal, affect the art he created? Editor: That makes me think differently about it now – the social context isn't just the story being told, but also how the story *can* be told using the available resources. Curator: Precisely! By looking at Goya’s material handling, we understand painting in 19th-century Spain wasn't about pure artistic inspiration, but about materials, social class, labour, and historical circumstances too. Editor: I've learned so much about Goya's context! Thanks for guiding me through a more material understanding of Goya's masterpiece.