William Hogarth - Biography

William Hogarth 1697-1764

Item #
3249

Title
The Idle Apprentice

Sold
$150 - 5/29/2002

William Hogarth was an English painter and printmaker who poignantly commented the English society of the eighteenth century with biting satire. The career and life of Hogarth were as unusual as his prints.

Biography

William Hogarth was born as the son of a shopkeeper (his mother) and a schoolmaster and publisher. The youth of William was overshadowed by the chronic financial problems of his father, who was even imprisoned because of his debts. This humiliating experience formed Hogarth for the rest of his life.

Hogarth started an apprenticeship as a silversmith in 1714, but never finished it. He then tried his luck as an independent engraver for copper plates. His early commissions were for cards, book illustrations and single prints.

In 1720, he registered at the John Vanderbank Art Academy. Around 1726 or earlier, William Hogarth was taught painting by James Thornhill whose daughter he later married. He earned some reputation for theater decoration paintings.

A Harlot's Progress

Hogarth experienced his first big financial success with A Harlot's Progress, a series of paintings from which he produced engravings in 1732. Only the engravings survived. The paintings were lost in a fire in 1755.

A Harlot's Progress is a set of 6 prints about the hapless life of a prostitute. It was a completely new kind of genre prints that were referred as moral history subjects.

After the big success of A Harlot's Progress, Hogarth published a male counterpart series, A Rake's Progress - a story in eight plates showing the decline of a promising young man into a life of drinking and immoral behavior.

Hogarth's Act from 1735

His successful print editions attracted many piracy copies. Hogarth fought fervently for a copyright law. Finally in 1735, the Copyright Act was passed by the House of Parliament - generally known as the Hogarth's Act.

Marriage à la Mode

In 1743, the painting series Marriage à la Mode was completed. It is considered his masterpiece. In Marriage à la Mode Hogarth turned his satire on the follies of the upper classes. The theme of this series is about marriage for money.

Although the prints of Marriage à la Mode sold well, the paintings did not. Therefore all prints designed afterwards, were created exclusively as print designs without any painted counterparts.

In 1747 followed the series Industry and Idleness, a moral story of an idle and an industrious apprentice in twelve plates.

The Bruiser, C. Churchill

In 1753 Hogarth wrote his book The Analysis of Beauty, a wrap-up of his artistic and esthetic principles.

Hogarth was a very controversial and individual character. Driven by a sense for justice, he missed no chance to get into a quarrel with his contemporaries. His most hated enemy was the British politician John Wilkes, whom he had ridiculed in one of his engravings. William Hogarth died on October 26, 1764.

Collecting William Hogarth Prints

Hogarth was a prolific printmaker. He had produced a total of more than 200 plates during his lifetime. His prints sold well, and even the first editions were often produced with several thousand copies. Therefore Hogarth prints are not too difficult to find.

Collecting Hogarth prints is a rewarding experience. His prints tell a thousand stories and there is so much to discover about the customs and manners of his era.

But it is not an easy field for a novice collector. And it is not only the piracy copies that cause a potential for confusion. After the death of the artist, new editions were published by his widow. After her death in 1789, the plates were passed to the publisher John Boydell and in 1818 sold to another publishing company. Hogarth prints were published until around 1870.

To make things even more complicated, there were also prints made after designs of William Hogarth like those by Thomas Cook.

How can you find out if a Hogarth print is from an early or a posthumous edition? It is difficult - even for an expert. The paper gives some clue. If the print is on a thick wove paper, it is most probably a nineteenth century edition. Basically nothing is wrong with a print from a late edition, as long as it is not offered for the price of an early edition.