« …the unfinished work was discovered underneath Goya’s Portrait of Don Ramon Satue, using a new X-ray technique.  The Rijksmuseum says the Spanish master may have covered up the portrait for political reasons.  Joseph Bonaparte was briefly King of Spain, from 1808-1813. When the Napoleonic army was driven out and Ferdinand VII restored to the throne, Goya, who retained the painting, would have wanted to distance himself from the French regime.   The artist had served the French king.  Eventually, unhappy with Ferdinand VII’s autocratic regime, he applied for permission to settle in France, where he lived until his death in 1828.   The new painting was revealed using a technique developed by the University of Antwerp and the Delft University of Technology.  According to the Rijksmuseum, the Goya painting is a formal portrait of a man wearing uniform.The detail on his face was never completed, but « the decorations embellishing the uniform are those of the highest ranks of a chivalric order instituted by Joseph Bonaparte when his brother, the emperor Napoleon, created him King Of Spain ».  Only 15 generals, plus Joseph, were entitled to wear the uniform and medal, although so far it has proved impossible to pin down exactly which of them is depicted  … »Goya était le ‘peintre de la cour’  de Joseph Bonaparte Hispaniarum et Indiarium Rex de 1808 à 1813… »