Goya, a corrupt court and a country that never learns

Goya, Godoy and the déjà vu of a Spain that repeats itself

Simply leafing through a biography of Goya is enough to touch, with your own fingers, the same rot we breathe today. Or maybe not: the historical mirror always plays tricks, distorts perspective and exaggerates shadows. But there are too many coincidences to file them away as folklore.

The court of Charles IV: the same reality show

Godoy at the top at 25, the Duchess of Alba dying without heirs, an aristocracy embroiled in jealousies that today would be settled on TikTok. Meanwhile, Madrid was a dung heap and the court preferred to move to Aranjuez. The elite managed the short term and kept a suitcase packed for the exit through Portugal. Read that last sentence again: see if it rings a bell.

The Black Paintings as a political diagnosis

The deaf, twilight Goya shut himself away to paint his own private witches' sabbath. Saturn Devouring His Sons is already a worn-out metaphor. What never wears out is The Dog: an animal drowning in the sand with no one coming to its rescue. Some people recognize themselves in that canvas. The reader of his biography searches the etchings for an explanation of today's distrust and political deafness.

The unrest spreads to the territory

The comparison doesn't stay in the salons. Outside the capital, in regions like La Sagra, the same cocktail that precedes riots is brewing: aid that never arrives, overwhelmed administrations and a population looking for scapegoats. Social tension is expressed today in the language of benefits and migration; yesterday, in the spark of the Mamelucos revolt. The set changes. The script doesn't.

If Goya could raise his head, he would surely grab his brushes. The question is whether this time there would be enough canvas for so much reality, and whether anyone at court would dare to look.