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Updated: August 14, 2024
The card is still among the Hogarth relics. He set up as an engraver on his own account, though he did study a little in Sir James Thornhill's art school; but whatever he learned he turned to characteristic account. He continued to make shop-cards, shop-bills, and book-plates.
Shop-bills and coats-of-arms were probably the mainstay of his livelihood at this period, though plates for books were beginning, little by little, to come in his way; but when in 1730 he clandestinely married the daughter of Sir James Thornhill, the Court painter was so incensed at this mèsalliance that he refused the young couple any acknowledgment.
For some time after the expiration of his apprenticeship, Hogarth continued to practise the trade to which he was bred; and his shop-bills, coats-of-arms, engravings upon tankards, etc., have been collected with an eagerness quite disproportionate to their value. Soon he procured employment in furnishing frontispieces and designs for the booksellers.
It is pretty well understood that this gratuitous treatment of the poor does not necessarily imply an excess of benevolence, any more than the gratuitous distribution of a trader's shop-bills is an evidence of remarkable generosity; in short, that it is one of those things which honest men often do from the best motives, but which rogues and impostors never fail to announce as one of their special recommendations.
William Blake, a hosier's son, employed himself in drawing designs on the backs of his father's shop-bills, and making sketches on the counter. Edward Bird, when a child only three or four years old, would mount a chair and draw figures on the walls, which he called French and English soldiers.
Gainsborough went sketching, when a schoolboy, in the woods of Sudbury, and at twelve he was a confirmed artist; he was a keen observer and a hard worker no picturesque feature of any scene he had once looked upon escaping his diligent pencil. William Blake, a hosier's son, employed himself in drawing designs on the backs of his father's shop-bills, and making sketches on the counter.
I was sorely distressed in my mind, at times, as to what I ought to do next; and began indeed to feel the difficulty getting too much for me, just when it was drawing on fast to its shocking and shameful end. We were then close upon Christmas time. Joshua had got his shop-bills well forward for sending out, and was gone to London on business, as was customary with him at this season of the year.
It is pretty well understood that this gratuitous treatment of the poor does not necessarily imply an excess of benevolence, any more than the gratuitous distribution of a trader's shop-bills is an evidence of remarkable generosity; in short, that it is one of those things which honest men often do from the best motives, but which rogues and impostors never fail to announce as one of their special recommendations.
A few are instructed in printing: in their little office, we found one ordinary press, besides a small one for taking proofs. They can execute shop-bills and placards for the tradesmen in the neighbourhood, and we received a copy of an annual report which had been printed very neatly by them.
The greater number of artists have sprung from humble life. If they had been born rich, they would probably never have been artists. They have had to work their way from one position to another; and to strengthen their nature by conquering difficulty. Hogarth began his career by engraving shop-bills. William Sharp began by engraving door-plates.
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