Eugenio Lucas Velázquez Madrid 1817-1870

Lacy;
Edwards, Paris;
His sale, Paris, Hôtel Drouot, May 25, 1905, lot 18;
Féral, Paris;
Xanroff, Paris;
With Wildenstein & Co., New York;
From whom purchased as by Goya by the Toledo Museum of Art in 1929 (Acc. no. 29.139, purchased with funds from the Libbey Endowment).

San Francisco, California Palace of the Legion of Honor, Exhibition of Paintings, Drawings, and Prints by Francisco Goya, June 5-July 4, 1937, no. 26;
Toledo, Toledo Museum of Art, Spanish Painting (cat. by J. Gudiol), March 16-April 27, 1941, no. 102;
New York, Wildenstein & Co., A Loan Exhibition of Goya, November 9-December 16, 1950, no. 47;
Richmond, Va., Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Goya: Paintings, Prints and Drawings, January 16-March 1, 1953.

X. Desparmet Fitz-Gerald, L'oeuvre peint de Goya, Paris 1928-50, vol. II, p. 270 (as by Goya);
E. Trapier, Eugenio Lucas y Padilla, New York 1940, p. 58, reproduced plate XLIII (as by Lucas);
J. Gudiol, Goya, New York 1941, p. 116, reproduced p. 112 (as by Goya);
E. Lafuente Ferrari, Antecedente, Coincidentias e Influencias del Arte de Goya, Madrid 1947, p. 230 (as by Lucas);
J. Gaya Nuño, Eugenio Lucas, Barcelona 1948, p. 33 (as by Lucas);
J. Gaya Nuño, La Pintura Española Fuera de España, Madrid 1958, no. 1119 (as by Goya, with incorrect provenance);
Goya and His Times, exhibition catalogue, London, Royal Academy 1963, p. 75, under no. 133;
J. Gudiol, Goya, New York 1971, Vol. I, pp. 221, 349, no. 757, Vol. IV, reproduced figures 1252, 1253 [detail] (as by Goya);
P. Gassier and J. Wilson, Goya, His Life and Work, London 1971, p. 356, notes 1672-75 (as attributed to Lucas);
R. de Angelis, L'opera pittorica completa di Goya, Milan 1974, no. 781 (as attributed to Goya);
The Toledo Museum of Art, European Paintings, Toledo 1976, pp. 69-70, reproduced Plate 61(as Attributed to Goya);
J.D. Morse, Old Master Paintings in North America, New York 1979, p. 144;
J.M. Arnaiz, Eugenio Lucas, su vida y su obra, Madrid 1981, pp. 106, 316, cat. no. 58, reproduced; also reproduced p. 103, no. 89 (as by Lucas).

Lucas Velázquez, long known as Lucas Padilla before research revealed his correct surname, is considered one of the most important Spanish painters working in the tradition of Goya in the period following that master's death.  His indebtedness to Goya's style is obvious in his use of color and the vigor of his brushwork, and many of his paintings have been wrongly identified as works by Goya (as, indeed, the present work was).

The composition of this painting is based on Goya's lithograph Bravo Toro (see fig. 1), one of a series of prints depicting bullfights in Goya's Bulls of Bordeaux series (1825).  A companion painting¹ after another of the prints in this series was also in the Edwards collection and sale in Paris (see Provenance).

 

1  The companion painting is after the lithograph entitled El Famoso Americano Ceballos, see J.M. Arnaiz, op.cit., pp. 102-3, reproduced no. 86 and no.. 88.