Félix Colón de Larriátegui

By 1794 Goya was the most sought-after portraitist at the Spanish court, and he was also, by then, completely deaf. A serious illness two years earlier had taken his hearing for good. None of that strain shows in this sitter. Félix Colón de Larriátegui was an officer of the royal infantry guards and, as it happens, a descendant of Christopher Columbus. He was also a writer. Goya puts a quill in his hand and stacks his own published volumes on military justice behind him, so you read the man as an author as much as a soldier. On his chest is the cross of the Order of Santiago, a knightly honor. He had only just been admitted to it in 1794, the same year he sat for this.