by Hisham Matar
First published 2025
The protagonist stands before Francisco Goya's "The Forge" in the Frick Collection, drawn into the painting's depiction of blacksmiths at work. The image triggers memories of his own father, a metalworker whose hands shaped iron just as the artist's hands shaped meaning on canvas. As he moves between the museum gallery and his childhood home, between present observation and past experience, he grapples with questions of inheritance and loss. The painting becomes a mirror reflecting his relationship with his father's craft, his father's silence, and the weight of stories passed down through generations. What begins as an encounter with art becomes a reckoning with family history and the tools we use to forge our own identities.
Genres: art, historical-fiction, biography-memoir, family-drama
Vibes: atmospheric, emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: family-secrets, intergenerational
Setting: Frick Collection
Period: 19th-century, 20th-century
72 pages · Hardcover · GILES