A scene in an artist's studio lit from an attic window (left). Four connoisseurs are grouped round a large canvas on an easel: an Apollo with a sheaf of arrows, head turned in profile to the left. The model is a tall black man in the pose of the Apollo but with very different features, the left hand holding the stick of a broom which supports the pose. A fifth connoisseur reaches up to alter the position of the model's head. The artist stands beside his canvas facing the invaders, the left hand, holding palette and brushes, rests on the canvas; he sucks his mahl-stick with a gloomy scowl. On the extreme right a cat sits in a cradle, behind which an alarmed little boy hides. The artist's wife, with an infant in her arms, faces the fire with her back to the visitors whose unwelcome intrusion is apparent. Behind is a bed with drawn curtains. Three casts from the antique decorate the bare room. The model's coat and hat lie on the ground (right). On the far left in the foreground a dog urinates against two canvases leaning against the wall
Alternative Title:
Assemblée des connisseurs
Description:
Titles in English and French etched below image. and Imperfect; sheet trimmed within plate mark with loss of all text from bottom edge. Missing text supplied from impression in the British Museum.
"Five elderly women of fashion attend an altar of Love in a temple whose walls are wreathed with roses. The fat Mrs. Hobart, in profile to the right, pours incense on the flames of the altar; in her right hand is an open book, 'Ninon'. Behind her (left) Lady Archer, with the nose of a bird of prey, leads a lamb garlanded with roses; she guides the animal with a riding-whip. Miss Jefferies walks beside Lady Archer holding a basket of flowers. On the extreme left Lady Mount-Edgcumb, aged and bent, holds a dove in each hand. On the right of the altar Lady Cecilia Johnstone plays a lyre. The altar is decorated with rams' heads, a heart, arrows, and roses. A sculptured group of the three Graces stands in an alcove in the wall above the altar. In the background (left) is a mountain peak, Parnassus, on which sits a tiny figure of Apollo, playing a fiddle, the sun irradiating his head."--British Museum online catalogue
Description:
Title etched below image., Printmaker from British Museum catalogue., Three lines of quoted text following title: "Here, Love his golden shafts employs; here lights "his constant lamp; and waves his purple wings; "reigns here and revels." Milton., Sheet trimmed within plate mark., Temporary local subject terms: Music -- Literary quotation: Milton -- Mythology: Parnassus -- Three graces -- Elizabeth Jeffries., Watermark: J. Whatman., and The ladies are identified in ink on the back of the print: Ldy. Cecilia Johnson, Mrs. Hobart, Ldy. Archer, Ldy. Edgcumbe.
Publisher:
Pubd. May 12th, 1787, by H. Humphrey, New Bond Street
Subject (Name):
Buckinghamshire, Albinia Hobart, Countess of, 1738-1816, Archer, Sarah West, Lady, 1741-1801, Mount Edgcumbe, Emma Gilbert, Lady, 1729-1807, and Johnston, Henrietta Cecilia, Lady, 1727-1817
Subject (Topic):
Graces, The, Apollo, Altars, Interiors, Temples, Books, Roses, and Lyres
"Minerva and Apollo seated on a bank of clouds, Minerva reaching down to guide by the wrist a female personification of Music, who approaches at left, holding an open book of sheet music, towards Apollo, who holds out his hand; in foreground right, a shield with trophies, including a drum, axe, turban and helmet."--British Museum online catalogue
Alternative Title:
Musick introduced to Apollo by Minerva and Music introduced to Apollo by Minerva
Description:
Title etched within image., Title from Paulson: Music introduced to Apollo by Minerva., Artist signature moved to above the line, lower right., Sheet trimmed to plate mark., and On page 48 in volume 1.
Publisher:
Sold by J. Clark engraver & printseller in Greys Inn
Title from first line of text below image., Formerly attributed to Hogarth., Sheet trimmed within plate mark., Not in Paulson, R. Hogarth's graphic works (3rd ed.)., Not in the Catalogue of prints and drawings in the British Museum. Division I, political and personal satires., and On page 5 in volume 1.
"Satire on the popularity of the Beggar's Opera in the form of a medley print. At top left a print shows two oval portraits, Lavinia Fenton as Polly Peachum on the left and Thomas Walker as Macheath on the right, two short columns of verse beneath. In the centre lies a print depicting a debased Parnassus: in the foreground muses drink from a barrel, one vomiting; a woman wearing a hat hands a basket to a muse sitting in a dust-cart drawn by a Pegasus; a cornucopia lies upended on the ground: in the background, is a boxing match surrounded on two sides with a temporary stand from which flies the flag of St George and to the right of which a bull and a bear are preceded by Apollo playing a fiddle; beneath are four lines of verse describing the scene. Behind the Parnassus print another shows the ghost of Jeremy Collier rising from his grave holding the pamphlet in which he had condemned "The Immoratlities of the English Stage", four lines of verse beneath. This print is overlaid by a smaller oblong print with four verses and portraits of Caleb D'Anvers (Nicholas Amhurst) Jonathan Swift, Alexander Pope and Lavinia Fenton (as Polly Peachum). On the left is a print in which Democritus and Heraclitus examine a globe together, eight lines of verse beneath. In the centre is an engraved address 'To Polly Peachum' quoted, according to the earlier state from The Daily Journal, April 19, 1728. At lower left is a print with a stage where a Apollo descends on a cloud to judge between rival singers (Faustina and Cuzzoni) to whom a group of gentlemen with asses' ears listen without judgement, two columns of verse beneath explain the scene. On the right, a scene by a river where a balance has been set up in which the Beggar's Opera outweighs Shakespeare, Ben Jonson, Addison, Nicholas Rowe and Thomas Otway; the personification of trade collapses in the arms of George II, assisted by Queen Caroline; verses beneath claim that the popularity of the Beggar's Opera is indicative of the sorry state of the country. At bottom right is a scene in Newgate with men and women sitting round a table on which is a punch bowl and pipes; they are toasting a laureated John Gay who sits at the centre, saying 'The Beggers Opera for yr', 'G(a)y for ever', 'Let's vote him King of the Beggers' and he responds, 'Yov'e done me too great an honour but I'll -'; a small child stands beside the table; two columns of verse beneath."-- British Museum online catalogue
Description:
Title from text engraved above image., "Poet G-" refers to John Gay., Later state, lacking references to 'Daily Journal April 19th. 1728' below the verses "to the Tune of the Soldier and ye Sailor" and to 'Daily Journal April 10 1798' below those "To Polly Peacham". Cf. Compare no. 1806 in v. 2 of Catalogue of prints and drawings in the British Museum. Division I, political and personal satires., Sheet trimmed within plate mark., and Mounted to 45 x 34 cm.
Publisher:
publisher not identified
Subject (Geographic):
Great Britain
Subject (Name):
Gay, John, 1685-1732, Gay, John, 1685-1732., Fenton, Lavinia, 1708-1760, Walker, Thomas, 1698-1744, Collier, Jeremy, 1650-1726, Bordoni, Faustina, 1697-1781., Amhurst, N. 1697-1742. (Nicholas),, George II, King of Great Britain, 1683-1760., Caroline, Queen, consort of George II, King of Great Britain, 1683-1737., Swift, Jonathan, 1667-1745., Pope, Alexander, 1688-1744., Heraclitus, of Ephesus., Democritus, approximately 460 B.C.-approximately 370 B.C., and Cuzzoni, Francesca, 1696-1778.
Subject (Topic):
Social life and customs, Anecdotes, facetiae, satire, etc, Pegasus (Greek mythology), Apollo, Muses (Greek deities), Parnassus, Mount (Greece), Prints, Prisons, and Theaters
