Tag Archives: Aquatints

Coelum ipsum petimus stultitia

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Coelum ipsum petimus stultitia

“A companion print to British Museum Satires Nos. 6700, 6701, 6703. An enormous balloon not completely inflated rests on a platform suspended between two masts; it is exploding, flames and thick clouds of smoke pour from a crease in its contour, a number of men with faggots on their backs run from the balloon, others are on the platform, which is covered by a large cloth or net which hangs in folds. In the air (left), as if having sprung from the exploding part of the balloon, is a small balloon in the form of a head, identical with that in British Museum Satires No. 6704, with the same inscription and passenger. From it streams, in place of a rope, the tail of a kite. This evidently represents the bursting of Keegan’s balloon in the garden of Foley House. “–British Museum online catalogue.

  • Printmaker: Sandby, Paul, 1731-1809, printmaker.
  • Title: Coelum ipsum petimus stultitia [graphic].
  • Publication: [London?] : [publisher not identified], [1784]

Catalog Record 

784.00.00.79+

Acquired April 2019

Put your finger in foxes hole, fox is not at home

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Woman holding a giant muff

A pretty young woman carries an enormous fur muff above her head. A key hangs from a string around her neck.

  • Title: Put your finger in foxes hole, fox is not at home [graphic].
  • Publication: [London] : Pubd. Jany. 1st, 1787, by J. Wicksteed, No. 30 Henrietta Str., Covent Garden, [1 January 1787]

Catalog Record 

787.01.01.11

Acquired February 2019

 

Hospitality kicking avarice out of doors

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Hospitality kicking avarice out of doors. Detailed description below.

A caricature of the new Lord Mayor of London: Harvey Combe stands centered in a hall, surrounded by a desperate looking group of people both rich and poor, who kneel and beg. A skeletal man (butcher?) holds a knife in one hand and a scroll in the other inscribed with a large order for meat: “12 haundres venison, 6 necks do., 8 turtles, 20 brace partridges, 20 pheasants, 20 brace woodcocks, 16 sirloins beef”. In the foreground lies another sheet which reads “Tripe Soup. Liver & Crow. Fried Tripe. Bill of Fare for 8 Novr.” The outgoing Lord Mayor, Sir Richard Glyn, who was notoriously spendthrift during his period in office, is seen being kicked out of the Mansion House holding large money bag. The two cats on the left and the dog following the butcher are also thin from malnutrition. Two large spiders have spun large webs below the archway on the left below are two cupids holding a heart molded above the archway.

  • Title: Hospitality kicking avarice out of doors, or, New tenants at a mansion house [graphic].
  • Distribution: [London] : Sold by all the printsellers in London, Novr. 9, 1799.

Catalog Record

799.11.09.02++

Acquired November 2018

A view in Regent’s Park, 1831

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A View in Regents Park. Detailed description below

Steam-driven coaches and carriages and three-wheeled vehicles loaded with well-dressed passengers fill Regent’s Park. The chaos and conjestion fill the park with dust and dark smoke and result in accidents.

  • Printmaker: Alken, Henry Thomas, 1784-1851, printmaker.
  • Title: A view in Regent’s Park, 1831 [graphic].
  • Publication: London : Pubd. Feby. 20, 1828, by S & J. Fuller, at their Sporting Gallery, 34 Rathbone Place, [20 February 1828]

Catalog Record 

828.02.20.01+

Acquired October 2018

All a growing, a growing, heres flowers for your gardens

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“A handsome young man sells pot-plants to a pretty young woman who stands on a door-step (left); a little girl beside her points eagerly to the flowers. He has a two-wheeled cart drawn by an ass; in it are small shrubs in large pots; two pots of flowering plants are on the ground. The background is formed by part of a palatial house having a portico raised on an arcade.”–British Museum online catalogue.

  • Printmaker: Merke, Henri, printmaker.
  • Title: All a growing, a growing, heres flowers for your gardens [graphic] / Rowlandson delin. ; Merke sculp.
  • Publication: London : Pub. Mar. 1, 1799, at R. Ackermann’s, 101 Strand, [1 March 1799]

Catalog Record 

799.03.01.07

Acquired May 2018

What a nice bit!

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A large black woman, smiling in her sleep, lies in a bed surrounded by bedcurtains. She wears a cap and earrings, and her large breasts hang out over her nightclothes. A thin old, white man also in nightclothes and a night cap ogles her by the candlelight from the candlestick he holds in his right hand.

  • Printmaker: Newton, Richard, 1777-1798, printmaker.
  • Title: What a nice bit! [graphic] / R. Newton delin.
  • Publication: London : Pub. by W. Holland, Oxford St., July 8, 1796.

Catalog Record

796.07.08.01+

Acquired May 2017

The history and antiquities of the city and suburbs of Worcester

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Extra-illustrated copy with an added 152 engravings and aquatints (dated from 1746 to the mid-19th century), two manuscript letters from the Duke of Beaufort, a pencil sketch of Edward Somerset, and a watercolor sketch of Worcester.

  • Author: Green, Valentine, 1739-1813.
  • Title: The history and antiquities of the city and suburbs of Worcester … / by Valentine Green.
  • Published: London : Printed for the author by W. Bulmer and Co., and sold by G. Nichol … [and 13 others], 1796.

Catalog Record 

Quarto 64 W92 796

Acquired March 2018

Anacreontick’s in full song

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“Eight elderly topers with pipes and glasses surround a small oblong table, on which are punch-bowl, wine-glasses, tobacco, &c. All are much caricatured; some sing, a parson sleeps, a dog howls. The room is lit by a chandelier; a bracket-clock points to 3.40, on it is carved a Bacchanalian figure of Time astride a cask. A bust portrait of Anacreon holding pen and paper is on the wall (left).”–British Museum online catalogue.

  • Printmaker: Gillray, James, 1756-1815, printmaker.
  • Title: Anacreontick’s in full song [graphic] / Js. Gillray invt. & fect.
  • Publication: London : Publish’d Decr. 1st, 1801, by H. Humphrey, 27 St. James’s Street, [1 December 1801]

Catalog Record

801.12.01.09+

Acquired July 2017

An apparition

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In a churchyard, a resurrection man holding a lantern, his hat and shovel at his feet, is surprised by ghost, rising from grave. In the background is a church and in the foreground, a skull and bone.

  • Printmaker: Newton, Richard, 1777-1798, printmaker.
  • Title: An apparition [graphic].
  • Edition: [State with aquatint].
  • Publication: London : Pubd. by W. Holland, No. 50 Oxford Street, May 1, 1790.

Catalog Record & Digital Collection

790.05.01.02.1+

Acquired November 2016

A Gallic idol

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“A symbolical bust of Napoleon, dressed as a Roman emperor, is on a rectangular base on which are title and inscription : ‘Symbolical of the Effects produced by that Cause which the enlightened (Fox) [Depicted] in ye Eighteenth Century sagaciously predicted would ultimately prove a Stupendous Monument of Human Wisdom!!!’ The head is turned in profile to the left.; the features are conventional but express ferocity, with glaring eye and fierce frown. It wears a fantastic helmet wreathed with laurel from which blood drips. The wreath is entwined by serpents, whose (three) heads are clustered at the back with words in large letters issuing from their jaws: ‘Rapine’, ‘Lust’, ‘Murder’. The word ‘Invasion’ issues in the same manner from the mouth. Above the wreath the helmet is encircled by a band on which are quasi-zodiacal signs: a scorpion, a sickle, a crescent, an arrow, a caduceus, a goat-like monster. On the helmet sits a grinning Devil, playing a fiddle and spreading his webbed wings over the idol‘s head, while from under one wing Death, a skeleton, peers out; he holds a javelin poised to strike and a cup of poison inscribed ‘Jaffa’ [see British Museum Satires No. 10063]. The shoulders are covered by drapery, drawn aside to reveal (rotten) ribs and a torn and bleeding heart which is transfixed by a dagger and a barbed spear. A scroll floats from the dagger inscribed ‘Wilsons Narrative’; the spear has a scroll inscribed ‘British Press’ and is surmounted by a cap of Liberty. Fragments torn from the heart are inscribed ‘Acre’ [see British Museum Satires No. 9412], ‘Egypt’ [see British Museum Satires No. 9250, &c], and ‘Irel[and]’, while in the middle of the heart is a triangular patch: ‘England’. The heart is surmounted by a crown made of blood-stained daggers with a central fleur-de-lis.”–British Museum online catalogue.

  • Printmaker: Barth, J. S., printmaker.
  • Title: A Gallic idol [graphic] / J. Boyne del. ; J. Barth sc.
  • Publication: London : Published by R. Cribb, 20 Augt. 1803.

Catalog Record & Digital Collection

803.08.20.01+

Acquired October 2016