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William Hogarth is unquestionably one of the greatest English artists and a man of remarkably individual character and thought. He is the great innovator in English art. On one hand, he was the first to paint themes from Shakespeare, Milton and the theater, and the founder of a wholly original genre of moral history, which was long known as Hogarthian. On the other, he investigated the aesthetic principles of his art, which resulted in his book “The Analysis of Beauty”(1753).
William
Hogarth was born on 10 November, 1697. He was the 5th child of Richard
Hogarth, a schoolmaster and classical scholar from the north of England
who had come to London in the mid-1680s. His father’s premature death in
1718 affected Hogarth’s early life, his training and forced him to earn
money.
In February 1713/14, Hogarth began his apprenticeship to a plate engraver,
Ellis Gamble, who was a distant relation. By April 1720, he set up an independent
business as an engraver. His first works included a number of commissions
for small etched cards and bookplates, and in 1721 he produced two inventive
engraved allegories. With these topical prints The
South Sea Scheme and The Lottery, which aroused
considerable attention, he started his black-and-white satires which made
him so widely known in Britain and abroad. His first success as a painter
was in the ‘conversational pieces’, in which figure informal groups of
family and friends surrounded by customary things from their everyday life.
He was not the inventor of the genre, and had many contemporary rivals,
but his pictures are marked with his own individuality: The
Fishing Party (c.1730), The Wedding
of Stephen Bechingham and Mary Cox (c.1730). In 1729, he married
a daughter of his painting teacher Sir James Thornhill. The scene from
The
Beggar’s Opera, the picture of an actual stage, brought him great success,
and at about about 1730, he was commissioned for several versions. The
result of this accomplishment was the idea of his own ‘theater’: the creation
of ‘pictorial dramas’ and reaching wider public through the means of engraving.
The first successful series The Harlot’s Progress, of which only
the engravings now exist (the originals were burnt in 1755), was immediately
followed by the tremendous verve of The Rake’s
Progress; the masterpiece of the story series The
Marriage a la Mode followed, after an interval of twelve years.
Hogarth’ satires were serious moral and social satires, besides being good
paintings. In 1935, he opened his own academy in St. Martyn's Lane.
In portraiture, Hogarth displays a great variety and originality: George
Arnold (c.1740), Mary Edwards
(1742), Bishop Benjamin Hoadly
(1743). The charm of childhood, the ability to compose a vivid group, a
delightful delicacy of color appear in The
Graham Children (1742). The portrait heads of his servants
are penetrating studies of character: Hogarth's
Servants. (c.1750). The painting of Captain
Thomas Coram (1740), the philanthropic sea captain who took
a leading part in the foundation of the Foundling Hospital, adapts the
formality of the ceremonial portrait to a democratic level. The painter’s
character is reflected faithfully in his forthright Self-Portrait
with Pug-Dog (1745). The quality of Hogarth as an artist is
seen to advantage in his sketches and one sketch in particular, the famous
The
Shrimp Girl (c.1740-1743) quickly executed with a limited range
of color, stands alone in his work, taking its place among the masterpieces
of the world in its harmony of form and content, its freshness and vitality.
Hogarth died in 1764 in London and is buried in Chiswick cemetery..
Notes
Benjamin Hoadly (1706-1757), son of Bishop
Hoadly, was a well known and successful physician and a Fellow of the
Royal Society. Hoadly wrote a successful comedy The Suspicious Husband,
dedicated to George II. The play was acted by David
Garrick at Covent Garden in 1747. Hoadly was very helpful to Hogarth
when he was writing his treatise The Analysis of Beauty.
See: William Hogarth. Benjamin Hoadly.
Catherine Edwards, daughter of a Frenchman,
Louis Vaslet. The portrait was painted at Shephall Manor in 1739 shortly
after her marriage to John Nodes; after 1761 she married for a second time
and became Mrs Edwards.
See: William Hogarth. Mrs. Catherine
Edwards.
Mary Edwards (1705-1743), the richest heiress
of her day with full power over her own estate. In 1731 she, secretly married
Lord Anne Hamilton, who owed his exceptional Christian name to his godmother
Queen Ann. Shortly afterwards he assumed the name of Edwards. The family
did not last long. Finding out that her husband's way of life could dissipate
her fortune, Mary Edwards repudiated her marrige to protect her son's interests
and her own. (See also the portrait of their baby son Gerald Anne Edwards)
The separation was ratified by a deed returning property from Lord Anne
to Mary. She was one of Hogarth’s loyallest patrons. It was at the
request of Mary that Hogarth returned to satirical painting.
See: William Hogarth. Gerard Anne Edwards
in His Cradle. Mary Edwards.
Bishop Benjamin Hoadly (1676-1761)
English prelate, born in Westerham, Kent. He was bishop successively of
Bangor (1715), Hereford (1721), Salisbury (1723) and Winchester (1734).
In his writings he defended the cause of civil and religious liberty against
both crown and clergy.
See: William Hogarth. Bishop Benjamin
Hoadly.
Sarah Malcolm, a young Irish charwoman, was
found guilty in one of the most sensational murder cases of 1733. Her case
made much noise among the public. Hogarth went to see her and and from
a sketch he subsequently painted her portrait.
See: William Hogarth. Sarah Malcolm
in Prison.
David Garrick (1717-1779) A great English
actor, manager and dramatist, he began his actor’s career in 1741 and retired
from the stage in 1776. He was equally at home in tragedy, comedy and farce,
his play attracted crowds of public. In 1749, he married Eva Marie Violetti
(1724-1822) a Catholic Viennese dancer. He was buried in Westminster Abbey.
See: William Hogarth. David Garrick with
His Wife Eva-Maria Veigel "La Violette" or "Violette".
Captain Thomas Coram (1668-1751),
English philantropist. Coram spent the earlier part of his life as a seaman.
In 1693, he settled in Massachusetts. He spent 10 years in America, where
he was a ship-builder, strengthened the Anglican church, later he promoted
settlement schemes in Georgia and Nova Scotia. In 1703, he came back to
England. Thanks to his initiative, energy and integrity the Foundling Hospital
for orphans was founded, of which Hogarth was a patron.
See: William Hogarth. Captain Thomas
Coram.
Bibliography:
Hogarth W. The Analysis of Beauty. Leningrad. 1987.
Painting of Europe. XIII-XX centuries. Encyclopedic Dictionary.
Moscow. Iskusstvo. 1999.
Engravings
by Hogarth by William Hogarth. Dover Pubns, 1975.
Hogarth:
Art and Politics 1750-1764 by Ronald Paulson. Rutgers University
Press, 1993.
Hogarth
(World of Art) by David Bindman. Thames & Hudson, 1985.
William
Hogarth by Matthew Craske, William Hogarth. Princeton Univ
Pr, 2000.