Description:
Hogarth prints were among the most popular available before the 19th century--so much so that it was easy to get pirated editions of his works. "Hogarth was a moral dramatist... in favor of raising satire to an artistic standard that would attract a cultivated if not intellectural audience. "Marriage a-la--Mode follows the unhappy marriage and fatal end of a young couple whose marriage was arranged for financial gain, As in all his works, these prints are full of detail and symbols, and give an accurate portrayal of funiture and interior decor of his period. Plate II, The Tete a Tete, one of a set of six hand-colored engravings titled "MARRIAGE A-LA-MODE. Plate II. The Tete a Tete, Invented & Painted by Wm. Hogarth. "Indifference, Lassitude, and Waste; Shews Revels in the Nuptial Taste. The Crafty Steward's bills are past; Yet Shrugs because it cannot Last." Interior showing a man and woman seated at the sides of a fireplace, with a man walking off to the right. In a room to the back right, a man is arranging chairs. In this, the second in the series of prints, the marriage of the Viscount and the merchant's daughter is quickly proving a disaster. The tired wife, who appears to have given a card party the previous evening, is at breakfast in the couple's expensive house which is now in disorder. The Viscount returns exhausted from a night spent away from home, probably at a brothel: the dog sniffs a lady's cap in his pocket. Their steward, carrying bills and a receipt, leaves the room to the left, his hand raised in despair at the disorder. The decoration of the room again comments on the action. The picture over the mantlepiece shows Cupid among ruins. In front of it is a bust with a broken nose, symbolising impotence. See E. McSherry Fowble, "Two Centuries of Prints in America 1680-1880, A Selective Catalogue of the Winterthur Museum Collection" (University Press of Virginia, 1987), pp. 19, 187.
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https://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?t=objects&type=ext&id_number=HD+59.077.2 |
