Jenny Uglow reviews Goya: The Witches and Old Women Album at the Courtauld Gallery, London, on view through May 25, 2015.

Uglow writes: "Most of the drawings date from 1819 to 1820, when Goya was in his early seventies. In 1819 he had bought his house in the country, where he covered the walls with his terrible 'Black Paintings,' like Saturn Devouring his Son, full of the fear of madness and the cruelty of the world. The 'Witches and Old Women' album provides a key to his dark imaginings. These are private drawings, seen by a few friends, in which Goya could be rude, macabre, bitter according to mood, unfettered by constraints of patrons or politeness."