Thomas Rowlandson: Pleasures and Pursuits in Georgian England

With heavy-handed humour and a low subject-matter, the work of Thomas Rowlandson (1757–1827) provides an invaluable insight into the workings and mentality of late Georgian society. He was quite simply a product of his times, who relished recording the street life of London and whose drawings and etchings reveal an attraction to repulsive visions of wickedness and hardship, whilst maintaining a high degree of humanity.

Thomas Rowlandson: Pleasures and Pursuits in Georgian reflects the growing emphasis on the social and political context of the satirical art of the eighteenth and early nineteenth century. In so doing, it rescues Rowlandson from what co-author Vic Gatrell calls “the immense condescension of posterity.” This catalogue explores Rowlandson’s unique perspective on Georgian society, on leisure and social life, and the crossing of class boundaries.

An introduction by curator Patricia Phagan describes Rowlandson’s position within a hierarchical society. Illustrated essays by Vic Gatrell and Amelia Rauser examine Rowlandson’s view of social life and leisure in London and his political satires.The images are drawn from the Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center at Vassar College as well as from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Yale Center for British Art, Lewis Walpole Library, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, and Vassar College Libraries, Archives and Special Collections.