Solo show
Goya's Graphic Imagination
8 Feb 2021 — 2 May 2021 at Metropolitan Museum of Art
· New York City
Goya's Graphic Imagination brings together a rich selection of prints and drawings by Francisco Goya, one of the most original and influential artists of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Presented at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 2021, the exhibition explores how Goya used works on paper — etchings, aquatints, lithographs, and drawings — as a laboratory for his most daring ideas.
From the biting social satire of the Caprichos to the harrowing scenes of the Desastres de la Guerra and the enigmatic imagery of the Disparates, the show traces the full arc of Goya's graphic imagination. Rarely exhibited drawings reveal the artist's working process and the restless, probing intelligence behind his finished prints.
The exhibition offers a rare opportunity to experience the intimacy and expressive power of Goya's works on paper, and to understand why his graphic art continues to resonate with such force today.
From the biting social satire of the Caprichos to the harrowing scenes of the Desastres de la Guerra and the enigmatic imagery of the Disparates, the show traces the full arc of Goya's graphic imagination. Rarely exhibited drawings reveal the artist's working process and the restless, probing intelligence behind his finished prints.
The exhibition offers a rare opportunity to experience the intimacy and expressive power of Goya's works on paper, and to understand why his graphic art continues to resonate with such force today.
About the artist
Francisco Goya
1746–1828 · Romanticism
Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes was a Spanish romantic painter and printmaker. He is considered the most important Spanish artist of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. His paintings, drawings, and engravings reflected contemporary historical upheavals and influenced important 19th- and…
About the artist →About the venue
Metropolitan Museum of Art
· New York City
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, colloquially referred to as the Met, is an encyclopedic art museum in New York City. By floor area, it is the fourth-largest museum in the world and the largest art museum in the Americas. With 5,727,258 visitors in fiscal year 2025, it was the most-visited museum in…
