Miguel Blay

MIGUEL BLAY Y FABREGA (Olot, 1866–Madrid, 1936).
“Homage to Goya,” c. 1928.
Modelled stucco.
It has a mended crack.
Signed.
Measurements: 25 x 17 cm; 41.5 x 33 cm (frame).
This stucco plaque depicts a nude man, seen from behind, holding a palette and some paintbrushes, in a clear allusion to the figure of the artist. The anatomy and curly hair evoke the image of Francisco de Goya, who is shown contemplating a symbolic universe constructed from some of the most emblematic works of his artistic output. Among them are recognizable references to *The Naked Maja*, *The Third of May 1808*, and the unsettling figures from the famous engraving *The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters*, thus synthesizing the thematic richness and significance of his legacy. The work may have been conceived as a preparatory model for the commemorative plaque commissioned by the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando to mark the first centennial of Goya’s death, celebrated in 1928. To mark this anniversary, the institution planned to create a new gallery dedicated to the painter and commissioned a commemorative plaque and a tombstone, reserving the commission exclusively for its academic members. Blay ultimately chose as his iconographic model the self-portrait that Goya included on the cover of the series *Los Caprichos* (1799), depicting him wearing a top hat, a frock coat, and a neckerchief. However, this stucco work offers a more allegorical and evocative interpretation, in which the painter is presented as the creator and witness of his own imagination, surrounded by the images that defined his genius and revolutionized the history of art.
Miguel Blay was a Spanish sculptor. He studied at the School of Drawing and Painting in Olot, directed by Josep Berga and Joaquín Vayreda. He later received a solid artistic education in Italy and France, and in Paris he attended the studio of the sculptor Henri Chapu. In 1892, he won first prize at the National Fine Arts Exhibition in Madrid for his sculpture *Los primeros fríos* (*The First Cold Snaps*), a Modernist work that influenced an entire generation of Catalan sculptors. She was one of the greatest female sculptors of her time and counted Julio Antonio among her students. She collaborated with architect Lluís Domènech i Montaner on the sculpture *La canción popular* (*The Folk Song*), which is situated on a corner of the façade of the Palau de la Música Catalana in Barcelona.In 1909, he was appointed a member of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando in Madrid and professor of modeling at the San Fernando School, a position he held until 1925, when he was appointed director of the Spanish Academy in Rome.