Hogarth : Life in Progress available to buy at Museum Bookstore

Hogarth : Life in Progress

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'Deft and richly detailed … rescues the artist from John Bull caricature' - Sunday Times

A splendidly vivid, richly informative and compelling account of Hogarth's life and artistic achievements

On a late spring night in 1732, a boisterous group of friends set out from their local pub. They are beginning a journey, a 'peregrination' that will take them through the gritty streets of Georgian London and along the River Thames as far as the Isle of Sheppey. And among them is an up-and-coming engraver and painter, just beginning to make a name for himself: William Hogarth. Hogarth's vision, to a vast degree, still defines the eighteenth century.

In this, the first biography for over twenty years, Jacqueline Riding brings him to vivid life, immersing us in the world he inhabited and from which he drew inspiration. At the same time, she introduces us to an artist who was far bolder and more various than we give him credit for: an ambitious self-made man, a devoted husband, a sensitive portraitist, an unmatched storyteller, philanthropist, technical innovator and author of a seminal work of art theory. Following in his own footsteps from humble beginnings to professional triumph (and occasional disaster), Hogarth illuminates the work and life of a great artist who embraced the highest principles even while charting humanity's lowest vices.

The Sunday Times Art Book of the Year 2021

Details
  • Author: Jacqueline Riding
  • Hardcover: 544 pages
  • Date published: July 2021
  • Language: English
  • ISBN: 978-1788163477
  • Product Dimensions: 24.6 x 16.6 cm
Reviews

'[An] excellent new biography ... Riding is particularly good on how the boy who was born into modest circumstances in 1697 spent much of the first half of his life wanting to be a 'proper' artist dealing with grand, historical subjects' Daily Mail

'Deft and richly detailed … rescues the artist from John Bull caricature' - Sunday Times

'An entertaining ... richly worked and varied "progress" ... amid the displays of wounded vanity and cantankerous self-assertion, there remains something hugely impressive, and rather attractive, in the Hogarth who emerges from these pages'  - The Oldie

'[Hogarth] was far more than a mere depicter of his age and an artist of skill and talent. He was also a complex and active human being who was living within the society he drew. As such, he is worthy of a thorough and considered biography that captures the man of the time as well as the artist. That is exactly what Jacqueline Riding has brilliantly provided ... [Hogarth] is of the highest value in showing there was so much more to Hogarth than 'Gin Lane', but in also explaining exactly why he was able to create such a lasting image of his times' ― London Historians

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