On-line gallery
- Reference number
- P07856
- Author
- Goya y Lucientes, Francisco de (Spanish)
- Title
- Tobias and the Angel
- Chronology
- Ca. 1787
- Technique
- Óleo
- Support
- Lienzo
- Measures
- 63,5 cm x 51,5 cm
- School
- Española
- Theme
- Religión
- On display
- Yes
- Procedence
- De procedencia incierta, aunque tal vez sea uno de los dos cuadros de este asunto citados por Francisco Zapater y Gómez en Zaragoza, como perteneciente a su colección, en 1863, y con anterioridad a su tío Martín Zapater, amigo de Goya. Pudo ser, asimismo, el registrado más adelante por el conde de la Viñaza, en 1887, en la colección M.de Heredia, Madrid, 1886, como procedente de Javier Goya. Desde fines del siglo XIX y hasta 2003 el cuadro permaneció en colección privada madrileña. Adquirido por el Estado con destino al Museo del Prado en 2003.
This devotional painting illustrates an Old Testament story (Tobias 6, 1-8) in which Tobias meets the Archangel Raphael. The story of the two Tobias, father and son, is a model of Jewish piety and the father foreshadows the suffering of Christ's Passion. He was faithful to the Law of God in the midst of generalized abuse and was put to the test on various occasions, always successfully. This scene depicts one of those events, when he went blind and God sent the Archangel Raphael to tell his son that his father could be cured by applying fish liver to his eyes.
Notable here is the use of light as the most important technical element. The Archangel's brilliance is, in fact, the only source of light in the whole composition.
