Luz y sombra. Goya and Spanish Realism

​​​​​​​This unique exhibition brings the groundbreaking oeuvre of Francisco de Goya y Lucientes (1746−1828) into dialogue with work by contemporaries and artists from later generations. With his fierce, gripping depictions of injustice, abuses and horrors of his time, Goya was the pivot in the development of a modernity firmly anchored in the Spanish realist tradition. Seventy artists — from the 18th century to the present — confront Goya’s expressive complexity and prove how his formal, conceptual and ideological legacy continues to intrigue, move and inspire.

Featuring artists such as, among others, Eugenio Lucas Velázquez, Ignacio Zuloaga, Pablo Picasso, José Gutiérrez Solana, Delhy Tejero, Jorge Oteiza, Antonio Saura, Eduardo Arroyo, Marisa González and Patricia Gadea.
With new work by, among others, Álvaro Perdices and Albert Serra.
Co-production AC/E Acción Cultural Española
In collaboration with Ministerio de Cultura de España: Dirección General de Patrimonio Cultural y Bellas Artes, Fundación Ibercaja, Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía en Mensajeros de la Paz
​​​​​​​This exhibition is organised and produced by EUROPALIA and hosted in the galleries of Bozar.

Programme around the exhibition
Free entry with an exhibition ticket 

• 6 Dec.'25 - 15:00 -17:00 - ​​​​​​​Sophía Rodríguez, La Maja Desnuda. Eaten by Saturn​​​​​​​
  In this creation for EUROPALIA ESPAÑA, Sophía Rodríguez embodies the body of sacrifice: a female body torn between desire, symbolic violence and political oppression. The performance departs from two of Francisco Goya’s most iconic and charged images: The Naked Maja, which led to his persecution, and Saturn Devouring His Son, one of the “black paintings”. In this work, Saturn devours La Maja, the female body. In Rodriguez’s performance, that body is no longer a passive projection surface, but a living presence that remembers, resists and responds.
  Contains nudity
  Commissioned by EUROPALIA
  With the support of TicTac Art Center and Pianofabriek
   
• Ongoing - Francisco López, Sonic Dark Goya
  This new sound composition commissioned for EUROPALIA ESPAÑA “was directly inspired by what I call the “dark Goya”: his outstanding series of etchings “Caprichos”, “The Disasters of War” and “Disparates”, as well as his most famous “Black Paintings”. All these works were created when the painter was already deaf. Hence, a body of work that was created in individual silence and introspection has inspired and given rise to a sonic environment, some two hundred years later."
  Free access to the piece with an exhibition ticket

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