Alegoria da Indústria

Around 1805, Manuel Godoy was the most powerful man in Spain, chief minister to Carlos the Fourth and, by common belief, the queen's favourite. He commissioned four round paintings from Goya for the staircase of his Madrid palace, allegories of the things an enlightened state was meant to nurture. This one is Industry. Two young women sit spinning at their wheels in what looks like a tapestry workshop, warmly lit, absorbed in their work. Behind them, half-lost in shadow, older women bend over their threads, and some have read them as the Fates who spin and cut the thread of life. Of the four panels, one, Science, is now lost. Industry, Agriculture and Commerce survive in the Prado.