Karl IV. in Rot

Charles IV came to the Spanish throne at the very end of 1788, and Goya, newly made a court painter, was set to work turning out official likenesses of the new king for council chambers and civic halls across the country. This is one of them: the king in red velvet, the golden ram of the Order of the Golden Fleece hanging at his chest, a crown half hidden in the curtains behind him. The image is calm and dutiful, the monarchy presenting itself as permanent. In Paris that same year, 1789, a crowd took the Bastille. Goya kept painting these royal replicas for years, and more than a decade later he would gather the whole family into one group portrait that flatters almost none of them.