… or pleasing things to know about the great London artist.
I’m sure that like me, you hold Hogarth as one of your favourite Londoners. Every year we remember him often, but especially on his birthday, 10 November (1697) and the day he passed away – today, 26 October (1764). Here’s a little crib sheet of Hogarthiana.
- Although of humble beginnings in Smithfield, Hogarth lived to become Sergeant Painter to the King.
- Like Dickens, his father went to debtors prison, having gone bust running a coffee house where only Latin was permitted to be spoken. It was in St John’s Gate, Clerkenwell.
- Even by the standard of the day, Hogarth was a shortarse, standing only five foot tall at the most.
- His father-in-law was Sir James Thornhill, celebrated in his day, but less well known now. Thornhill painted the inside of the dome of St Paul’s Cathedral, the Painted Hall in Greenwich, and the best known life portrait of notorious prison escapee, Jack Sheppard.
- Hogarth was a key figure in the foundation of copyright under the law, thanks to his lobbying for the Engravers’ Copyright Act in 1735 (aka “Hogarth’s Act”), which, with subsequent variations, still protects musicians, artists and other creative professionals to this day.
- Hogarth was a founding governor and great supporter of Captain Coram’s Foundling Hospital. He and his wife Jane supervised wet nurseries near their home in Chiswick for babies from the institution. The couple never had children of their own.
- Hogarth, having been criticised by charismatic political firebrand John Wilkes, created arguably the best-known image of the politician, a vicious caricature.
- The Hogarth family tomb in Chiswick was endowed by the actor David Garrick, a great friend of his.
- Hogarth ordered a trade card for his pug, Trump, from a printer at one of the Thames ice fairs.
- On his only foray beyond these shores, Hogarth got arrested in Calais in 1748 – ostensibly for spying. This didn’t help to disabuse his jaundiced view of foreigners and their ways.
There are, of course, many many other pleasing Hogarth things. Please add your own in the Comments.
I knew his father-in-law Sir James Thornhill very well 🙂 I was delighted when Thornhill painted the inside of the dome of St Paul’s Cathedral and the Painted Hall in Greenwich, two super jobs.
But here are the questions: did Thornhill approve of Hogarth’s risk taking? And did Thornhill’s important commissions help Hogarth in his own career?
The questions aren’t quite the ones I would have posed! But here goes . . . The short answers are “probably not” and “nothing to do with WH’s career”.
Thornhill and his wife must have been surprised to say the least when Hogarth eloped with their daughter but they were soon reconciled and the younger couple lived with and then near the older one. Hogarth’s artistic and commercial success with The Harlot’s Progress must have reassured Sir J that WH could look after his daughter and wasn’t a risk. Hogarth hugely admired Sir J and, hating injustice, stuck up for him and campaigned against William Kent, when the latter elbowed Sir J aside for a royal commission.
The problem was that WH wanted to emulate his father-in-law as a history painter, resulting in some not altogether successful work like the paintings on the staircase at St Bartholomew’s when WH’s stunning skill was as a portrait painter. I don’t think Thornhill’s commissions helped WH, but the family was close, with the widowed Lady Thornhill moving into the household and family possessions handed down – for example an amazing set of Delft platters painted by Sir J with the signs of the zodiac, now in the British Museum (britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/search.aspx?searchText=delft+++zodiac).