The egg seller
1814 - 1823. Brush, Bistre, Wash, Grey-brown ink.Not on display
Goya’s Album C exemplifies the complexity of his work. Made during the Peninsular War and the posterior repression under the reign of Ferdinand VII, it addresses subjects linked to many facets of that period. Other authors believe this album extends through the years of the Liberal Triennium (1820-23), as they see a relation between some of its drawings and the joy associated with the restoration of the Constitution of Cadiz in 1820. Still, those compositions can just as well be viewed in the same context as similar compositions from Goya’s Disasters of War. The subjects in Album C range from aspects of daily life, including numerous beggars, to dream visions of the world of night. One especially large group consists of drawings with victims of the Inquisition or of cruelty in prisons, and this recently led Juliet Wilson-Bareau to call it the Inquisition Album, although as we already stated, this is not the only subject addressed therein. In fact, another notable group of images criticizes the habits of monastic orders and the life of friars defrocked by the French authorities’ disentailment decrees.
Of Goya’s albums, this is the one with the most works, as well as the only one to have survived almost intact. It was never taken apart, and was not subjected to consecutive sales. Hence, it was almost complete when it arrived at the Museo del Prado from the Museo de la Trinidad. Of 126 known drawings, 120 are at the Museo del Prado. One is at the Biblioteca Nacional de Madrid (C 56), one at the British Museum in London (C 88), and two at the Hispanic Society of America in New York (C 71 and C 128). Finally, two others are in a private collection in that city (C 11 and C 78) (Text drawn from Matilla, J. M.: "Álbum C 91, Muchos an acabado asi. Álbum C 101, No se puede mirar", en Goya en tiempos de guerra, Museo del Prado, 2008, p. 393).
