"A naked, bald, and grotesquely obese man stands on the tips of his toes about to plunge, or rather topple, into a bath, in which he admires, Narcissus-like, his own absurd reflection. He is poised on a platform projecting over the bath; behind him stands a comely young woman, watching in astonishment. A flesh-brush is beside her, another is on a seat on the opposite side of the bath, where a print of Narcissus is on the wall. An ugly old woman's head looks through a small rectangular aperture up m the wail; she is much amused at the scene. On the wall is a placard: 'Glowcocks Bagnio Cold and Hot Baths Cupping Sweating and otherwise cleansing the body performed here Lodgings for Gentlemen.'"--British Museum online catalogue
Description:
Title etched below image. and Sheet trimmed with plate mark on top edge.
Publisher:
Pubd. April 6, 1803, by R. Ackermann, N. 101 Strand, London
Subject (Name):
Narcissus (Greek mythological character),
Subject (Topic):
Prostitution, Public baths, Obesity, Therapeutic baths, Bathing, Nudes, and Signs (Notices)
"Two scenes on one plate. In the top scene a hefty nude woman is helped from a bathing machine into the water by a younger nude woman and older dressed woman. Within the enclosure there are two partially clothed women. In the background there is a second bathing machine with a nude woman shown falling into the water but held around the waist by another figure. In the bottom scene, within an interior by an open fireplace, a hefty nude man falls back in a wooden tub as he is scrubbed by an older woman. At left a young woman pours in hot water from a kettle onto the man."--Metropolitan Museum of Art online catalog
Description:
Titles etched below images., Two images on one plate, each bearing the signature "Rowlandson 1800" in lower left and Ackermann's imprint below., Bottom image has remnants of an earlier imprint, mostly burnished from plate, following printmaker's signature: Pud. March [...?] 1800 [...?] Adelphi., Imperfect; sheet trimmed with loss of image and text. Description based on a more perfect impression in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, accession no.: 59.533.723., For a copy of the top image, published ca. 1820 by Sidebotham, see no. 14099 in the Catalogue of prints and drawings in the British Museum. Division I, political and personal satires, v. 10. See also: Grego, J. Rowlandson the caricaturist, v. 2, pages 41, 397., 1 print : etching, hand-colored ; sheet 22.4 x 25.7 cm., and Imperfect; only bottom image entitled "Fresh water" is present, the top image having been trimmed away.
Publisher:
Pubd. March 25, 1800, at R. Ackermann's Repository of the Arts, 101 Strand
Subject (Topic):
Public baths, Bathing, Nudes, Bathtubs & showers, Fireplaces, Kettles, and Obesity
In the woods beside a stream a young woman bather removes her last stocking while a young man hidden among the reeds looks at her with pleasure
Description:
Title etched below image. and Late-20th century restrike on modern paper, similar to others from the same collection bearing pencil annotations suggesting printing dates around 1980. The copper plate would have been in the possession of the successor Leadenhall Press in England at the time, according to Nicholas J.S. Knowles.
"Nude figures resting on a river bank in the shade of a tree; one woman reclining, another seated beside her at right, seen from behind and holding drapery over herself; a couple embracing at left, another couple in the water at right."--British Museum online catalogue
Description:
Title etched below image. and For a different version of this print, either an earlier state or a different plate altogether, see the British Museum online catalogue, registration no.: 1981,U.257.