Desastres de la Guerra

Looking through my photos, a series fell into my hands that I made in April while visiting the Georgia O'Keefe exhibition in Basel. These are etchings by Francisco de Goya, exhibited in the museum's vestibule because of the Ukraine war?

Esto es peor (This is worse)
A man, his anus impaled on a branch stump.

Indeed. In an introductory text written in English, the museum wrote:

The selection of prints presented here from Goya's Desastres de la guerra is a testament against violence and war in light of the invasion of the Ukraine by the Russian military.

Que hai que hacer mas? (What more can be done?)
Remember Bond's nearly castration in Goldfinger?

Goya made the series of graphics from 1810 to 1814 on the occasion of the Spanish War of Liberation (Guerra de la Independencia Española) against Napoleon. The series of 82 etchings called Desastres de la Guerra (Horrors of War) was published posthumously in 1863.

The May 2, 1808 (Dos de Mayo) uprisings in Madrid against the French occupation forces are considered the beginning of armed resistance. 

Bárbaros! (Barbarians)

This developed into the first guerrilla war in modern history, which both sides waged with extreme cruelty.

Lo merecia (He deserved it)

The failure of the guerrillas to keep a red line between civilians and combatants led to a high level of violence against civilians on the part of regular French troops. 

Lo mismo (The same)
A desperate Spanish retaliation.

How the scenes resemble each other.
Peasants slay a horseman in the Thirty Years' War.
A contemporary engraving by Hans Ulrich Franck

The brutality of the French, who increasingly attacked the population indiscriminately, and the retaliation of the Spanish led to significant casualties, especially among the rural population. It could not break the will of the Spanish to resist.

Again and again, rapes:

Amarga presencia (Bitter to be present)

No quieren (They don't want to)
You are not going to rape my daughter

Madre infeliz (Unhappy mother)

Al cementerio (It all ends at the cemetery)

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