''Southwark Fair'' is a 1733

genre painting Genre painting (or petit genre) is the painting of genre art, which depicts aspects of everyday life by portraying ordinary people engaged in common activities. One common definition of a genre scene is that it shows figures to whom no identity ca ...

and engraving by the British

artist An artist is a person engaged in an activity related to creating art, practicing the arts, or demonstrating the work of art. The most common usage (in both everyday speech and academic discourse) refers to a practitioner in the visual arts o ...

William Hogarth William Hogarth (; 10 November 1697 – 26 October 1764) was an English painter, engraving, engraver, pictorial social satire, satirist, editorial cartoonist and occasional writer on art. His work ranges from Realism (visual arts), realistic p ...

. The scene, which was first called simply "A Fair" and only later became associated with Southwark Fair, shows theatrical performances, musicians, a rope-dancer and other entertainers. A stage collapses during a performance. The old church of St. George the Martyr can also be seen, which was torn down and replaced by a new church at the time the picture was executed. It is said to depict a view of a

fair A fair (archaic: faire or fayre) is a gathering of people for a variety of entertainment or commercial activities. Fairs are typically temporary with scheduled times lasting from an afternoon to several weeks. Fairs showcase a wide range of go ...

being held in the Borough of Southwark, then a separate settlement from

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

on the south side of

London Bridge The name "London Bridge" refers to several historic crossings that have spanned the River Thames between the City of London and Southwark in central London since Roman Britain, Roman times. The current crossing, which opened to traffic in 197 ...

. Dating back to 1409, the fair had originally lasted for three days but by Hogarth's time it continued for around two weeks. It was abolished in 1762 because of increasing vice and disturbance. Today, the painting is in the collection of the Cincinnati Art Museum in

Ohio Ohio ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. It borders Lake Erie to the north, Pennsylvania to the east, West Virginia to the southeast, Kentucky to the southwest, Indiana to the ...

.Lawrence p.246

References

Bibliography

* Einberg, Elizabeth. ''William Hogarth: A Complete Catalogue of the Paintings'', New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2016, pp. 116-120. * Lawrence, Cynthia. ''Women and Art in Early Modern Europe: Patrons, Collectors, and Connoisseurs''. Pennsylvania State University, 1999, p. 246. * Paulson, Ronald. ''Hogarth's Graphic Works'', 3rd edn, London: The Print Room, 1989, pp. 86-89. * Paulson, Ronald. ''Hogarth, Volume 2: High Art and Low, 1732-1750'', New Brunswick and London: Rutgers University Press, 1992, pp. 15ff. * Riding, Jacqueline. ''Hogarth: Life in Progress''. Profile Books, 2021, p. 37. * Stevens, Andrew. ''Hogarth and the Shows of London''. University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1996, p. 25. * Wheatley, Henry B. ''Hogarth's London: Pictures of the Manners of the Eighteenth Century'', London: Constable and Company, 1909, pp. 423-435.

External Links

Benjamin N. Ungar, "Take Me to the Southwark Fair: William Hogarth's Snapshot of the Life and Times of England's Migrating Early 18th Century Poor"
1733 paintings Paintings by William Hogarth Genre paintings London in art Paintings of black people {{18C-painting-stub