School of Art

Contact Details

School of Art
Aberystwyth University
Buarth Mawr
Aberystwyth
Ceredigion
SY23 1NG

Tel: +44 (0)1970 622460

Fax: +44 (0)1970 622461

Email: artschool@aber.ac.uk


Display artist/maker:

William Hogarth

Born: 1697, UK, England, London   Died: 1764, London

Painter and engraver. Renowned for his satirical prints commenting upon contemporary moral, social and political issues. Hogarth’s father, Richard, was a failed businessman and Latin scholar who spent 5 years in a debtors’ prison. Apprenticed to the silver plate engraver Ellis Gamble at the age of 16, William was talented enough to have his own business by the age of 23 printing billheads, book illustrations and trade cards. At this time he also studied painting and was tutored by Sir James Thornhill (1675-1734), whose daughter, Jane, Hogarth married in 1729. He painted small family groups and conversation pieces, with some success, but turned to morality paintings which he aimed to use as blueprints for engravings. Consequently ‘A Harlot’s Progess’ and ‘A Rake’s Progress’ were immensely popular, much more so in financial terms than the original paintings. Unfortunately, this resulted in his prints being copied. Hogarth complained vigorously to influential friends about this threat to his livelihood, and in 1735 the Engravers Copyright Act was passed. Later in this same year he established his own guild school, St Martin's Lane Academy, which ran until 1755 and is often seen as a precursor of the Royal Academy. In 1753 Hogarth published his own treatise on aesthetics entitled ‘The Analysis of Beauty’.

Objects in the collections associated with this artist/maker

Analysis of Beauty I PR3426 Prints

Analysis of Beauty II PR3427 Prints

Credulity, Superstition, Fanaticism. A Medley PR4350 Prints

Cruelty in Perfection PR3425 Prints

Hogarth Painting the Comic Muse PR4349 Prints

Hudibras beats Sidrophel and his man Whacus PR3554 Prints

The First Stage of Cruelty PR3423 Prints

The Second Stage of Cruelty PR3424 Prints

William Hogarth from the Original Picture in the Collection of John Josiah Boydell PR4348 Prints




 
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