Witches’ Sabbath, Francisco Goya (c.1798) | Mini Series

Witches’ Sabbath, Francisco Goya (c.1798)6x6 Mini Series Francisco Goya’s Witches’ Sabbath gathers its viewers into a sinister midnight congregation where superstition takes its most grotesque form. At the heart of the composition, a towering, horned figure—often interpreted as the Devil—presides over a huddle of misshapen witches and ghoulish acolytes. The surrounding darkness teems with bats, twisted silhouettes, and ritual gestures, each element steeped in unease. Painted during the Enlightenment yet obsessed with Spain’s lingering medieval fears, Goya uses this scene not to endorse belief in the occult but to mock it—transforming witchcraft into a biting allegory for ignorance, fanaticism, and the oppressive power of the Church. His mastery of shadow and fleeting illumination freezes the moment in an atmosphere of dread, while his loose, urgent brushwork keeps the vision unstable, as though it might vanish—or lunge forward—at any moment. Witches’ Sabbath is both nightmare and satir