Election Candidates
James Gillray (published by Hannah Humphrey (English, c. 1745-1818))
published May 20, 1807
- Medium
- Hand-colored etching on ivory wove paper
- Classification
- Dimensions
- Image: 31.5 × 25 cm (12 7/16 × 9 7/8 in.); Plate: 36 × 25.8 cm (14 3/16 × 10 3/16 in.); Sheet: 36.8 × 28.7 cm (14 1/2 × 11 5/16 in.)
- Culture
- England
- Museum
- Art Institute of Chicago, Prints and Drawings
- Credit line
- Gift of Thomas F. Furness in memory of William McCallin McKee
- Rights
- Public domain (CC0), as the museum states it.
- Who can see it
- Teens profiles and older: its museum says too little about what it shows to place it for younger viewers. How works are placed
View at the Art Institute of Chicago
About this work
Despite its jovial hand coloring, James Gillray’s response to the 1807 parliamentary election in the district of Westminster caricatures real candidates with ruthlessness. Here Gillray implied that the winner, the radical Sir Francis Burdett, had extra help. Burdett becomes the goose atop the pole, supported by a demonic figure with a pitchfork, while the agitated constituency below degenerates into a mob.
Description © Art Institute of Chicago, CC BY 4.0
