Hommage à Goya
Jean-Baptiste Sécheret
1997
Original etching and aquatint on copper in black
36,5 x 44,5 cm
Numbered in pencil lower right on 50, titled in pencil lower center, signed and dated by the artist in pencil lower right
Reference catalog: Plumart G 74
Like the Spanish painter Francisco de Goya, Jean-Baptiste Sécheret lived in Madrid for several years, which explains his proximity to and knowledge of the artist. They also share a substantial body of engraved work.
The infinity of small, fine strokes creates a realistic print in which the play of light and shade is central, a technique that follows in the painter's footsteps.
The skull certainly evokes death, but more broadly, it echoes the Hispanic artist's entire oeuvre, which was dark, tormented and marked by violence. In the background, a bust refers to a self-portrait of Goya in a high hat, which he printed as the frontispiece to his first published suite of engravings, Los Caprichos (1).
(1) http://bd h-rd.bne.es/viewer.vm?id=0000051045&page=1
