Enfant sur un bélier

This was never meant to hang as a painting. It is a cartoon, a full-size design in oil that weavers at the royal tapestry works would copy thread by thread into wool. Goya made it around 1786 for the dining room of King Carlos the Third at El Pardo, the palace outside Madrid. The big panels in that room showed the four seasons. This was one of the small pieces squeezed in above a door, so Goya let himself have some fun, setting a small boy astride a ram. The child wears what was then the height of fashion for boys, a close-fitting striped skeleton suit with a wide sash. Making these designs for the crown was the steady court work that kept Goya close to the king.