Crowd in a Park; page 31 from the "Images of Spain" album (F)

Goya (Francisco de Goya y Lucientes)

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

A striking feature of this drawing is the thick frame, suggesting a scene observed through a window. The viewer looks out from an elevated position to a large group of figures receding into the distance. While the outdoor setting has not been identified, various parks in Madrid—Casa de Campo, Buen Retiro, and the Meadow of San Isidro—have been proposed. Goya might have been inspired by such locations, but the composition’s structure and emphasis on types of groupings imply that it does not record what he saw; rather, it interprets the subject.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Department’s vast collection of works on paper comprises approximately 21,000 drawings, 1.2 million prints, and 12,000 illustrated books created in Europe and the Americas from about 1400 to the present day. Since its foundation in 1916, the Department has been committed to collecting a wide range of works on paper, which includes both pieces that are incredibly rare and lauded for their aesthetic appeal, as well as material that is more popular, functional, and ephemeral. The broad scope of the department’s collecting encourages questions of connoisseurship as well as those pertaining to function and context, and demonstrates the vital role that prints, drawings, and illustrated books have played throughout history.

Metropolitan Museum of Art