The Third of May 1808
French soldiers execute Spanish civilians by firing squad after an uprising in Madrid. Goya shows not a heroic death but anonymous, mechanical violence. The picture has been called the first modern war painting.
The man in the white shirt spreads his arms like Christ on the cross; the soldiers have no faces.
On 2 May 1808 the people of Madrid rose up against the French troops occupying the city. The uprising was crushed, and during the following night and morning hundreds of Spaniards were shot. Goya was court painter in Madrid and lived through the occupation. The war that followed, the Spanish War of Independence, lasted until 1814. The events took place partly on the hill of Príncipe Pío.
Once the French had withdrawn, in 1814 Goya asked the country’s new government for support to commemorate with his brush the most heroic events of the uprising. He painted two large pictures: The Second of May 1808, showing the fighting at the Puerta del Sol, and The Third of May 1808, showing the executions. Both are now in the Prado in Madrid.
A line of French soldiers stands with their backs to us, aiming their rifles. Their faces are not visible. Opposite them is a group of Spaniards, some already lying dead in their blood. A man in a white shirt and yellow trousers flings his arms straight out. He is lit by a large lantern on the ground. Beside him a monk prays, and others hide their faces in their hands. In the background the city lies in darkness.
The man in white has often been compared to Christ on the cross. In one of his palms a mark has been seen that recalls a nail wound. The light from the lantern makes him the centre of the picture. The soldiers form a mechanical, faceless row, while the victims are individuals with different reactions: horror, prayer, defiance. The figure is kneeling, yet he is still larger than the soldiers, which gives him particular weight.
Goya painted with loose, rapid brushstrokes. The colours are dark with strong accents of white, yellow and red. No heroes die gloriously and no angel comes to the rescue. The picture depicts the violence of war without glorification. It is connected to Goya’s print series The Disasters of War, which he made during the same period. The lantern is the only source of light and casts a harsh glare over the condemned.
The painting was not shown publicly until many years later. It began to be listed in the Prado’s catalogues in the 1870s. During the Spanish Civil War it was evacuated in 1936, and the lorry carrying it was involved in an accident. Both of Goya’s May pictures were damaged. They were thoroughly restored in 2008, when the damage from the accident was repaired.
The picture has been called the first modern war painting. Édouard Manet based his Execution of Emperor Maximilian on it, and Picasso drew on it in Massacre in Korea. Goya’s way of showing the victims of war rather than the victors has had a great influence on later art and photography. The picture appeals to the viewer’s compassion rather than to national pride.