Brigadier General Alberto Foraster

There is another portrait underneath this one. X-rays show that Goya worked over an earlier picture of Manuel Godoy, the royal favourite who effectively ran Spain for Charles IV, painted about a decade before by a different artist and showing Godoy in his role as secretary of state. A scrap of the old drapery is still visible in the top right corner. The two men are connected. Alberto Foraster was a cavalry officer from the north-east of Spain whose career had stalled until he came to Godoy's notice, and in 1800 he was made commanding officer of the Royal Veterinary School in Madrid. Goya gave him a wide red collar edged with gold, a sabre in one hand and his hat in the other, and a tired, heavily furrowed face that looks straight out.