Goya's Physiognomic Studies on View in Rome

An exhibition at the Instituto Cervantes in Rome explores Francisco Goya's engagement with physiognomy, the practice of deducing character from physical appearance. The show features lithographs from his series Los Caprichos (1799), Los Desastres (1810), and Los Disparates (1815-23), highlighting how Goya transformed human features into animalistic, monstrous forms. Curated by Juan Bordes, the exhibition draws parallels between Goya's iconography and historical sources from Aristotle to Petrus Camper, who introduced the facial angle concept. The works reflect Goya's interest in the macabre, the pathological, and the degraded, embodying an anti-naturalistic realism that, according to art historian Giulio Carlo Argan, opposes the beautiful with the ugly. The exhibition positions Goya's graphic art as a mirror of his preoccupation with anomalies, madness, and the alienation of the modern self.