Lazarillo de Tormes (1808–12) by Francisco de Goya
Your doctor will look into your mouth to see if your throat is red and your tonsils are swollen and covered with white or yellow spots. He or she will also look for small red spots on the roof of your mouth.
Are anyone of you familiar with Lazarillo de Tormes and able to tell me what this scene is about and why Goya decided to paint it? The painting, which I found today, has a strange attraction. It is as something forbidden is going on. The man looking into the mouth of the kid is not a physician, I gather.
Update: found the explanation of the painting. The man is a blind man and the guardian of Lazarillo, he suspects that the Lazarillo has stolen food and wants to inspect it. Lazarillo‘s can’t stand the feeling of the man’s nose stuck in his throat and throws up in his face.
I love this picture, I have it in a book on medical art where it is called “Diphtheria”. The brushwork is amazing.
I think the disturbing element comes from the way the boy is trapped between the legs of the man, held by the throat and has fingers forced in his mouth.
The nose of the man has a very phallic quality and the eyes become testicles and the mouth an anus, – a similar face can be seen in Goya’s Capricho number 54, “The Shamefaced One” – “There are men whose faces are the most indecent parts of thier whole bodies and it would be a good thing if those who have such unfortunate and ridiculous faces were to put them in thier breeches”
I really like Goya’s work though I’m not familiar with this image. is it at the prado? I’ll be in madrid in 3 weeks…..