Lecture | Scorn, Greed, Malevolence & Mischief: Goya’s graphic expression of emotions – Deanna Petherbridge | University of Melbourne

Francisco Goya, No es siempre bueno el rigor, 1816-1820 c.

Francisco Goya, No es siempre bueno el rigor, 1816-1820 c.

This presentation will examine the consummate skill with which Goya represents emotions in his late private albums and some of the print series associated with these drawings. From 1795-6 Goya borrows the figure of the bruja or witch as an historically subversive topos for portraying his disgust with a corrupt clergy, monarchy and cruel social order. As the proportions of his figures change in the album drawings so his ability to suggest subtlety of facial and bodily emotions in his brush and pen work deepens. Language also becomes more intense for Goya, isolated by his total deafness, and the texts appended to drawings and prints are variably metaphoric, playing with language/visual puns or seeming blocks to clarity of meaning. Like his drawings the titles become sparer but more esoteric, especially in his late self-imposed exile to Bordeux. The relationship between ‘speaking’ facial expressions, bodily construction, emotion and textual hints therefore become essential cross referents in approaching the powerful late works.

Deanna Petherbridge CBE is an artist, writer and curator primarily concerned with drawing. Since the early 1990’s she has been promoting the importance of drawing in relation to contemporary art practice in journal articles, books, catalogues, exhibitions, public lectures and conference papers including the series Drawing towards Enquiry at the National Gallery in London in 2006, in association with the University of the Arts, and Camberwell School of Art. Her book The Primacy of Drawing: Histories & Theories of Practice, Yale University Press was published June 2010 in the USA and UK. It examines the importance of drawing as significant practice in Western art history from the fifteenth century as well as its relevance to contemporary artists working with multiple practices. Deanna Petherbridge (Professor Emeritus, University of the West of England, Bristol) was Visiting Professor of Drawing at the University of the Arts London from 2009 to 2012. She was Professor of Drawing at the Royal College of Art from 1995 to 2001 where she launched the Centre for Drawing Research, the first doctoral programme in drawing in the UK and ran an extensive course of drawing workshops and open lectures for the whole college. She was Arnolfini Professor of Drawing at the University of the West of England, Bristol between 2002 & 2006 and held a two year Research Professorship at the University of Lincoln 2007 – 2009.

Date: Monday, 12th October 2015, 6:15pm-7:45pm
Venue: Macmahon Ball Theatre, Old Arts Building, The University of Melbourne, PARKVILLE VIC 3010

Free to attend, register here.

Enquiries contact Jessica Scott in the Centre for the History of Emotions at che-melb-admin@unimelb.edu.au or 8344 5152.