A Rake's Progress, by William Hograth

William Hogarth is a artist illustrator who used satire in his work, one of these was called A Rakes Progress. The set of works looks at the fall off a rake (Tom), the man bellow and how his life falls apart by making the wrong choices. In the first image he inherited money from his father (who appears counting money in the painting above the fireplace). His pregnant fiancée, Sarah is rejected by him and he does this through all the pictures. The second image shows Tom (the Rake) being entertained by musicians who are dressed in fine clothing. The third one  is of a wild party at a brothel where the prostitutes steal some of his things. they have black spots to cover syphilitic scars. In the fourth image he is being taken to a celebration at the palace on a sedan chair. He just avoids being arrested for debt by bailiffs by his former fiancée Sarah. I like how oil is being poured on his head like anointing and yet he does not take this as a blessing. In the fifth one he is being married to an old rich maid, who is also ugly, he does this to try and get rich again but he is also looking at the younger maid of his new wife. Sarah is in the back ground trying to get into the wedding with her baby mother. The sixth image is of him at a gambling house and losing all his new fortune so he is pleading for it back. He is disheartened as all is lost in the seventh image and he is thrown in debtors jail. He begins to go mad, his angry new wife is here and as is Sarah who has fainted in shock of this. The final image he has gone insane and is placed in Bedlam mental asylum where he is chained and barely clothed and still ignores Sarah who is there comforting him. The other people there are meant to be mad, and there are women who are watching them perform.
Overall this is quite tragic, the drawings(prints) are placed out for the first time in a story board. It was interesting to see how he had what he should of done right in front of his but he ignored this and continued to do the same thing which led him to be mad.
The pictures themselves have small things representing things which tell the story.
Like the story there is no real humor but more tragedy.













William Hogarth has also done another one like this called A Harlot's Progress.

Here is another of his works called Gin Lane

In it everything is telling you about what gin does to people. The mother who was feeding the baby now drops the baby.
This one is called bear street which is a similar idea.