Plate 18 from ‘The Disasters of War’ (Los Desastres de la Guerra): ‘Bury them and keep quiet.’ (Enterrar y callar.)

Description

Francisco Goya’s Bury Them and Keep Quiet confronts the viewer with bodies left exposed on open ground. Behind them, two standing figures cover their faces, their gestures hovering between grief, revulsion and helplessness. The unusually clear light does nothing to soften the scene. Instead, it makes the abandoned bodies starkly visible and gives the survivors nowhere to turn their attention.

Plate 18 of The Disasters of War replaces the noise of combat with a terrible stillness. Its short title suggests the few actions left to those who survive: burial and silence. Made in response to the Peninsular War, the series was first published in 1863. Here Goya offers neither a victorious army nor a consoling resolution, only a direct encounter with loss and the limits of human response.

Read our guide to giclée prints or browse the Goya collection.