It was in 1775, probably through the mediation of his brother-in-law, when Goya, an almost unknown genius in those years, was commissioned to make oil cartoons that would serve as models for the products of the Royal Tapestry Factory. This company produced ornamental tapestry works for the court that did not seek any meaning or depth in the results, only that the pieces were pleasing to the eye.
However, for Goya, the production of these cartoons (which were the basis of the tapestries) meant a good income and being able to approach the court. He started his work doing maybe half a dozen. In all of them, he put the best of his genius: the theme, the compositions, the figures, the colors, the texture, and the contrasts of light and shadow. Goya was a costumbrista within the Spanish traditions in these drawings. His works were fiercely realistic, with a great display of powerful and passionate colors. Goya handed over the projects to the director of the Royal Manufacture, where the highest pictorial talents in Spain converged.
After receiving and examining Goya's projects, the director, Don Rafael Mengs, rejected them because, according to him, the sense of theme, composition, and figures were too popular. Goya denied his luck. He did not understand how the Spanish could be despised and submerged in the background when in the first instance, every artist who deigned to be one should live grateful for the themes provided by the customs and traditions of the Spanish people.
However, he gave up; it wasn't possible to survive and excel as a painter if he did not surrender to the fashion of the wealthy classes and the King. His oil cartoons for tapestries became academic, Italian landscapes, Gallic and Flemish country figures, and the rural scenes of an impossible neoclassicism. But in these rehashed themes, Goya's genius gradually introduced, here and there, where he could, the Spanish customs and traditions.
They gradually appeared, to the extent that the upholsterers made their cartoons and the tapestries sold, more Goyesque themes, vivid paintings later transformed into tapestries, that gave him international prestige.
Tapestries such as The Parasol, The Shepherdesses, The Drinkers, Children Picking Fruit, etc., consecrated him, and Goya became the owner of the allegory, the anecdote, and the mundane theme.
He shaped his nationalist art with notable roots in tradition and popular customs. So, he was celebrated as a great artist.