Madrid, June 18 (IANS/EFE) The Goya drawing "Si yerras los tiras!" (If you miss the mark!), a political allegory in which the figure may be King Ferdinand VII, will be sold at auction July 2 in London, Christie's said.
The drawing, which is expected to sell for between 1.2 million and 1.7 million euros ($1.6 million to $2.2 million), is from the artist's "Black Border Album" and belongs to a private collector.
The album "is one of the most important and best known, and it can be dated at between 1816 and 1818", Old Master Drawings Department director Benjamin Peronnet told EFE.
"The album drawings, which explore every aspect of Goya's fertile imagination, were not preparatory studies for paintings or prints, but independent works which acted as a form of visual journal. The present drawing, like many of those from the Black Border Album, offers a tantalising glimpse of Goya's attitudes to the moral, political and social predicaments of contemporary Spain," Christie's said in the lot notes posted on its web site.
The drawing has been exhibited on several occasions, including at Madrid's Prado Museum, the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and highlights Goya's analysis of political and social conditions in Spain in the early 19th century.
"Although the hunt appears to be a pretty simple theme, with Goya everything is complicated. The hunter misses the mark. The dog, instead of looking at the prey, turns his head toward the hunter, who, according to studies, could be Ferdinand VII," Peronnet said.
The drawing is in "very good" condition, Peronnet said.
"Si yerras los tiras!" was last sold at auction in 1987 at Christie's.
--IANS/EFE
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