Hogarth to ‘Spitting Image’

Tutor-set Essay Questions

The following questions are designed to act as suggestions for your work on the end-of-course assignment. You are quite at liberty to disregard these questions, and devise an essay question of your own, or to alter any one of these questions according to your own specific interests, as appropriate.

Essay submission deadline: 3rd January 2014

Completed essays may either be submitted in class – or sent (as Word of PDF files) to the following e-mail address:

davidtmorgan2@yahoo.co.uk

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Annibale Carracci: caricature heads (c.1590)

“Is not the caricaturist’s task exactly the same as the classical artist’s? Both see the lasting truth beneath the surface of mere outward appearance. Both try to help nature accomplish its plan. The one may strive to visualise the perfect form and to realise it in his work, the other to grasp the perfect deformity, and thus reveal the very essence of a personality…” - Annibale Carracci quoted

How convincing do you find this view of the art of caricature? Discuss, with reference to two works form the period covered during the course.

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Select two of the following works by Hogarth, and provide a visual and thematic analysis of the work(s) in question. What specific themes does Hogarth address in the works which you have selected? How successful is he in addressing these themes? Would you describe these as works of (a) visual comedy, (b) visual satire, or (c) caricature?

William Hogarth: Gin Lane (1751)

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William Hogarth: A Harlot's Progress: Plate 6 (1732)

William Hogarth: Marriage A-la-Mode: 1. The Marriage Settlement (c.1743)

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William Hogarth: Industry and Idleness 11 : The Idle 'Prentice Executed at Tyburn (1747)

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Hogarth: Capt. Thomas Coram (1740)

“Hogarth tells us that he deliberately attempted a ‘mighty portrait’ which would serve as a spirited riposte to Vanloo, in order to rally the British portrait painters to regain their lost clientele… [Hogarth] …could take pride in the warm and unaffected realism of his portrait of the unaffected sea captain, and it is an indication of the strength of Hogarth’s image that it should succeed in bringing a distinctly English sensibility to a type of portrait associated with quite a different world of ideas. By domesticating the French Grand Manner portrait Hogarth made it fit for the depiction of professional men…” – Bindman

How accurate is this analysis of Hogarth’s portrait of Capt. Coram? In what ways might this painting be said to relate to Hogarth’s work as a visual satirist? Are there aspects of this image which might be said to verge on caricature? Discuss.

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James Gillray: The King of Brobdingnag and Gullver (c.1800)

How successfully does Gillray marshal the art of caricature in the service of Napoleonic era politics? Discuss with reference to two works by James Gillray

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Thomas Rowlandson: Runaway Horse (c.1790-95, pen and grey wash on paper

“Rowlandson had been brought up in the French quarters of London by an aunt who came of a French family, he spoke fluent French (probably from an early age), and his style as it eventually developed in the 1780s, had a French facility and technical ease, and French sophistication, elegance and delicacy…” - John Hayes: Rowlandson – Watercolours and Drawings (London, 1972)

Is this a convincing description of Rowlandson’s oeuvre, considered as a whole? Is he a practitioner of ‘French sophistication, elegance and delicacy’ – or are there other aspects to his work? Discuss with reference to two works by James Gillray

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George Cruikshank: The Radical’s Arms (c.1810)

“With Cruikshank’s political prints we follow the tradition of Gillray and, similarly, the artist’s political affiliations were subject to flux, whether due to seeing both sides of the argument or as an opportunity for career and pen…” - Mark Bills: The Art of Satire – London In Caricature (Museum of London, 2006)

How convincing an analysis is this? Does Cruikshank assume the mantle of Gillray as smoothly as this quote seems to suggest? Discuss with reference to two works by George Cruikshank

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George Cruikshank: Fashionables of 1817

“If any aspect of Georgian caricature moved effortlessly into the Regency period it was the satire of London fashion… The craze of dandyism swept the Regency metropolis… Cruikshank’s images, albeit more accomplished than most, reflect the craze for satirical prints of dandies, a continuation of the Georgian tradition of satires of fashion…” - Mark Bills: The Art of Satire – London In Caricature (Museum of London, 2006)

How convincing is this analysis? Does Cruikshank effectively ‘continue the Georgian tradition of satires of fashion?’- or are there perhaps significant point of contrast between the ‘satires of fashion’ produced during earlier era, and those produced by Cruikshank? Discuss with reference to two works: one by Gillray and one by Cruikshank

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John Heartfield: Adolph the Superman – Swallows GoldAnd Spouts Junk (1932)

Given that the target of Heartfield’s satirical attack here is obviously Hitler (then on the verge of assuming absolute power in Germany), how exactly does Heartfield attack his target, in visual satirical terms? What specific visual devices (juxtaposition, distortion, etc.) does he employ?

How far – if at all – does the fact that Heartfield uses photographic imagery (as opposed to drawings or engravings) affect his treatment of his subject? Does it make his satirical attack more, or less, biting?

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THE PRODIGAL'S RETURN (SIR WINSTON LEONARD SPENCER CHURCHILL)BY SIR (JOHN) BERNARD PARTRIDGE

PEN AND INK ON ARTISTS' BOARD, 1924

Present a visual and thematic analysis of the above cartoon? How, in visual and symbolic terms does it convey its message?

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David Low: All Behind You, Winston (c.1940)

What specific visual and graphic devices does Low use to make his point here? Is this cartoon a work of (a) satire, (b) caricature, or (c) propaganda? Or does it perhaps contain

elements of more than one of these? You should try to justify your answer by reference to specific aspects or qualities of the image itself.

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MARGARET HILDA THATCHER (NÉE ROBERTS), BARONESS THATCHERBY GERALD SCARFE

PEN AND INDIAN INK, 1983

How effective is Scarfe’s caricature of Margaret Thatcher? How does it compare with earlier examples of political caricature? Discuss, with reference to one other work, either by Gillray or by Cruikshank

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“During… [my] time at University I studied the fascinating subject of comedy, and in particular television comedy and satire. It seemed to me – and still seems- to be a useful ‘safety valve’ in society. It remains one of the few places where ‘the public’, whoever they are, can exert their authority and say some of the less-than-charming things that they really think about our wonderful, caring politicians and about the over-sized egos and pay cheques of our celebrities…” – Paul Clark, scriptwriter for Spitting Image (OUSSA Summer School, Oxford, 2009)

How convincing do you find this view of the broader ‘politics of visual satire’? Does it act as a ‘safety valve’, releasing pent up political frustrations? If so, could it in fact be said to serve the purposes of the very politicians whom it sets out to attack? Discuss, Discuss with reference to two works covered during the course

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