Artwork

Mendigos que se llevan solos en Bordeaux (Beggars Who Get about on Their Own in Bordeaux)

Mendigos que se llevan solos en Bordeaux (Beggars Who Get about on Their Own in Bordeaux) is a chalk drawing by the Romanticist artist Francisco de Goya. It dates from 1826 and is held in the collection of the National Gallery of Art.

Inscription: Inscribed:upper right in black chalk: 29; across bottom in black chalk: Mendigos qe. selleban solos en Bordeaux; by later hand, lower center verso in graphite: Goya

About this work

Overview

In 1826 Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes produced a small drawing titled Mendigos que se llevan solos en Bordeaux using black chalk on a green‑toned laid paper. The work records a brief scene of two itinerant beggars navigating the streets of Bordeaux, their figures rendered with a mixture of precise facial detail and looser bodily strokes.

Subject & Meaning

The composition focuses on two crippled men who rely on crutches and walking sticks, emphasizing their physical struggle and marginal status. By isolating the figures against a neutral background, Goya draws attention to the human condition of poverty and resilience, reflecting his broader interest in the everyday hardships of his contemporaries.

Technique & Style

Executed in monochrome chalk, the drawing balances fine line work for the faces with broader, gestural marks for the bodies, creating a contrast that highlights expression over anatomical completeness. The greenish hue of the laid paper adds a subtle tonal foundation, while the limited palette underscores the starkness of the subject.

History & Provenance

Created during Goya’s exile in Bordeaux, the piece likely derives from direct observation of the city’s street life at the time. It remains part of the artist’s late‑period output, documenting his continued engagement with social themes despite his displacement from Spain.

Context

The work belongs to a series of drawings and prints in which Goya explored the plight of the disenfranchised, a motif also evident in his earlier Los Caprichos and later Los Desastres de la Guerra. The Bordeaux setting situates the drawing within the broader European context of post‑Napoleonic upheaval and urban poverty.