{"id":824,"date":"2018-06-29T12:13:16","date_gmt":"2018-06-29T12:13:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/demo.academiathemes.com\/museo-museum\/?page_id=824"},"modified":"2018-06-29T12:13:16","modified_gmt":"2018-06-29T12:13:16","slug":"sketching-politics","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/library.umbc.edu\/cruikshank\/sketching-politics\/","title":{"rendered":"SKETCHING POLITICS"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

In William Makepeace Thackeray\u2019s admiring homage to Cruikshank in an 1840 Westminster Review<\/em> article, he contends that Cruikshank\u2019s political sketches are authentic because \u201che, living amongst the public, has with them a general wide-hearted sympathy; that he laughs at what they laugh at\u201d including the \u201cfollies of the great.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n

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\"Two<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

The items in this collection focus both on George Cruikshank\u2019s work as a political satirist in his earliest years and as a prominent illustrator for the temperance movement in his twilight phase. Below, within the \u201cPolitical Satire\u201d<\/strong> collection, you will find Cruikshank\u2019s inventive, thoughtful, and humorous depictions of political figures and events from the Regency and early Victorian eras. Within the \u201cTemperance\u201d<\/strong> collection, viewers will find Cruikshank\u2019s captivating illustrations of alcohol\u2019s influence on Victorian Britain, which include depictions of alcoholism and social decay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cruikshank\u2019s political identity as an illustrator is ambiguous, sometimes frustratingly so. Regarding Cruikshank’s career as a political satirist, historian Vic Gatrell observes, \u201cI think of him always as a chameleon\u2026He was never really consistent in his politics and his morality\u201d (BBC Radio 4<\/a>). In his early years, Cruikshank earned money as an engraver and illustrator for commentators on the British political scene such as pamphleteer William Hone <\/a>(1780-1742) and John Mitford<\/a> (1782-1831), publisher of the satirical magazine \u201cThe Scourge.\u201d Even earlier than this, he illustrated \u201cDr. Syntax\u2019s\u201d poetic Life of Napoleon<\/em> (1815), providing 29 plates in which Napoleon is rendered practically in miniature.\u00a0Following in a tradition of British graphic satire blazed by William Hogarth, James Gilray, and Thomas Rowlandson [see Contemporaries<\/a> page], Cruikshank managed to find his own style.<\/p>\n\n\n

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\"A<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

While Cruikshank\u2019s political beliefs are difficult to summarize, his tendency to portray members of the royal family and other famous political figures as power-hungry, emotionally erratic, and extravagantly dressed demonstrates an artistic drive to highlight the madness and opulence of British politics. From lampooning the crown to judging society\u2019s self-indulgent spirit sipping, Cruikshank\u2019s sketches shone a light on the political and social questions that punctuated mid-century London. Indeed, as contemporary biographer Robert Patten observes, Cruikshank leaned into \u201cthe subversive freedom of etching contradictions into the copperplate.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One cause to which Cruikshank was unambiguously dedicated in his later years was temperance. Prior to his sober turn in the late 1840s, \u201csurely no man drank with more fervour and enjoyment\u201d biographer Blanchard Jerrold exclaimed. Cruikshank developed a great interest in illustrating for the temperance movement after struggling with alcoholism as a younger man and watching his father, brother and Gillray succumb to premature deaths. In fact, Jerrold suggests that Cruikshank was converted by his own sketches for the 8-plate glyphographic series The Bottle<\/em>, transitioning from occasional sipper to zealous teetotaler. This dramatic shift in lifestyle and the horror captured within his engravings of alcohol\u2019s effect on the entire family makes his temperance sketches all the more captivating.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Click on the images below to explore each collection<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In William Makepeace Thackeray\u2019s admiring homage to Cruikshank in an 1840 Westminster Review article, he contends that Cruikshank\u2019s political sketches are authentic because \u201che, living amongst the public, has with…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2443,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-824","page","type-page","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/library.umbc.edu\/cruikshank\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/824","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/library.umbc.edu\/cruikshank\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/library.umbc.edu\/cruikshank\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/library.umbc.edu\/cruikshank\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/library.umbc.edu\/cruikshank\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=824"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/library.umbc.edu\/cruikshank\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/824\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/library.umbc.edu\/cruikshank\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2443"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/library.umbc.edu\/cruikshank\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=824"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}