The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters, plate 43 from Los Caprichos

The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters, plate 43 from Los Caprichos by Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes: Hovering between the grotesque and the comical, Franc…

What to notice

Find the sleeping artist surrounded by owls and bats, then compare the orderly drawing tools with the swarm rising from darkness behind him.

Discover

Hovering between the grotesque and the comical, Francisco de Goya’s series Los caprichos ( Whims or Fantasies ) consists of 80 etchings satirizing Spanish society during the late 18th century. For this iconic image, which may have been intended as the title page of the series, Goya represented himself as an artist who has fallen asleep at his drawing table. In the background are his nightmares, the macabre tormenters that pervade the rest of these prints.