Portrait of Félix de Azara y Perera

Don Félix de Azara y Perera was born in Barbuñales, in the province of Huesca, in 1742 and is considered one of Aragon’s most illustrious and versatile figures. A military engineer with a brilliant career, in 1781 he was ordered to travel to the Río de la Plata to demarcate the borders between the Spanish and Portuguese territories in Paraguay and the colony of Sacramento. During which time he conducted the first major study of Paraguay’s geography, flora, fauna, economic resources, and transportation networks. He published his scientific work in various journals, in which he was half a century ahead of the observations that would lead Darwin to formulate the theory of the evolution of species.

Félix de Azara was a man of liberal convictions; he supported Palafox and funded the resistance against the French invaders during the War of Independence. After the war, opposed as he was to Ferdinand’s absolutism, he retired to his family home in Barbuñales, where he died in 1821.

At the time of the portrait, he was a brigadier in the Spanish Navy and a member of the Council of Fortification and Defense of the Indies. She depicts him in a studio, with shelves in the background filled with colorful stuffed birds and four-legged animals, and her technique is characterized by broad, loose brushstrokes. Azara’s face is beautifully shaped, and he is wearing his brigadier’s uniform—a black jacket and striking yellow trousers. In his right hand, he holds a note bearing the subject’s name, Goya’s signature, and the date, 1805. His bicorn hat is visible on the desk, along with three books alluding to his publications and scientific studies.