Goya's portrait of Tiburcio Perez y Cuervo was not the result of a commission, and it is a very different kind of painting from the artist's court portraits which are generally more formal in nature. It is a personal record of the features of a friend whom Goya chose to paint.

Tiburcio Perez y Cuervo was an architect. He was born in 1785, he studied architecture in the early 1800s at the Royal Academy in Madrid, where Goya was Director of Painting. The personal relationship between artist and subject is revealed in the informality of the sitter's pose and clothing, and in his friendly smile. Official portraits tend to provide a sitter with surroundings and attributes that indicate status and profession. When relaxed and away from his architect's office, Tiburcio Perez y Cuervo probably had the habit of clasping his arms across his chest in the way Goya presents him here. In fact, he must have been among the artist's closest friends since Goya entrusted the care of his daughter Rosario to him when he left Spain in 1824, not long after this portrait was painted.

Perhaps the most immediately striking feature of the painting is its almost total lack of colour. It was made shortly after the famous and grim 'Black Paintings' with which Goya decorated his house, the Quinta del Sordo (House of the Deaf Man). The monochrome quality of this picture may be a reflection of that series. Overall, the effect of the painting is to make the subject, with his bright flesh and white shirt, into a beacon of light.

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