Hest slynges til jorden af en tyr 1815 - 1816

Curator: The raw power just jumps off the paper. Look at the energy, it's almost palpable. Editor: Indeed. This is "Hest slynges til jorden af en tyr," or "Horse tossed to the ground by a bull", an engraving made between 1815 and 1816 by Francisco Goya, residing here at the SMK. Curator: Goya really captures the violent encounter. You can almost feel the horse’s panic and the bull's brute strength. It really gets to the roots of nature as force. Editor: Bullfighting as spectacle was intensely popular in Spain and widely depicted in art. Think of it as a ritual where society's codes confront untamed animal instincts. Goya, though, brings in an almost savage element here, focusing on a particular moment of defeat. Curator: I think there is a deliberate rawness that is fascinating here, even in this black and white format. There is minimal composition, he doesn't seem to want to add layers of interpretation to obscure the image, it's almost as though it just *is*, a window into this dramatic, awful, real event. Look at the crowd blurred into the background - they could be figures of any period observing the same thing, an immediate reminder of something truly elemental about human nature and spectator violence. Editor: Goya witnessed first-hand the brutality of war, the fragility of social order in the Napoleonic invasion, and the chaos of his era seeps into his bullfighting scenes. What seems to have made an impression on him were the deeply unequal power relations within these scenes. This specific print certainly captures the spectacle of violence that held an intense public appeal at the time. Curator: I see this image speaking to our psychological relationship with violence, too. Arenas have appeared as places of death and performance in so many cultures throughout history. Goya's ability to boil these rituals to the most brutal, raw moments makes him especially good at bringing to the surface what such spaces mean. Editor: This is a piece that prompts introspection regarding our perceptions, what our values and judgements are within this brutal context. The Spanish court largely endorsed bullfighting in Goya's day. That says a great deal about the history of taste. Curator: The enduring symbolism is hard to deny. Thank you, I feel I see a bit deeper. Editor: My pleasure. The layers of meaning always reveal themselves in surprising ways.