Francisco Goya, the Spanish artist, started life painting religious scenes, court portraits and rural idylls before descending into darker subjects as his pessimism about human behaviour and a repressive political situation clouded his optimism.
His etchings, the Caprichos, depicted what he described as “the innumerable foibles and follies to be found in any civilized society, and from the common prejudices and deceitful practices which custom, ignorance, or self-interest have made usual”.
A serious illness that left him deaf in his forties sent him into even darker realms of fantasy nightmare. Yard with Lunatics is a vision of loneliness, fear and social alienation. The condemnation of brutality towards prisoners focused on the degradation of the human figure. From an earlier search for ideal beauty, he descended through a nervous breakdown into paintings that reflected his self-doubt, anxiety and fear.
He had several children, only one of who survived to adulthood, which many scholars believe influenced his later, melancholic themes. By the time of his wife’s death in 1812, he was preparing the etchings known as The Disasters of War, regarded as a visual protest against the violence of the period and the move against liberalism in the aftermath of the restoration of the Bourbon monarchy in 1814. The scenes are singularly disturbing, sometimes macabre in their depiction of battlefield horror, and represent an outraged conscience in the face of death and destruction. His scenes of atrocities, starvation, degradation and humiliation have been described as the “prodigious flowering of rage”.
Saturn eating his Children was one of the late Black Paintings from the last years of his life, with his embittered attitude toward the move away from liberalism and his own mental panic, terror, fear and hysteria expressed in shocking detail.
He was born 30 March 1748 in Spain (at 11.30am according to Andre Barbault though I am not so sure.)
He had an Aries Sun conjunct Venus and Mercury opposition Saturn square a sensitive Moon Neptune in Cancer. His Sun opposition Saturn formed a talented Half Grand Sextile to Jupiter in Sagittarius and Uranus in Aquarius. He also had a difficult yod of Pluto in Scorpio sextile South Node inconjunct Mars in Aries.
His emphasised Saturn in Libra square Neptune would be idealistic, hoping for improvements in social conditions and behaviour as well as progress politically away from hierarchical, repressive regimes. But he would also be drawn to the darker, ruthless energies represented by his Mars inconjunct Pluto and the lack of development towards fair and just times by his South Node in Virgo. His personal tragedies and illness, never mind the social/political situation would also undermine his faith (Pisces North Node).
When his illness descended tr Uranus was tugging at one leg of his yod, conjunct Pluto which would send his life onto a different track. His Solar Arc Neptune was moving to conjunct his South Node and his Solar Arc Saturn to conjunct his Jupiter.
His acute disappointment on various fronts sent him into the depths of his tortured unconscious.
Raphael, 27 March 1483 JC 9.30 pm, Urbino, Italy, one of the great masters of an earlier period, also had a Sun Venus in Aries which was in a lively trine to Uranus; and he also had a confident Jupiter Pluto conjunction in Libra trine Mars in Gemini. He had a more upbeat and outgoing chart than Goya, though he did die on his 37th birthday when is Solar Arc Neptune was square his Sun.