Hogarth: Place and Progress. Sir John Soane’s Museum, London

Brian Allen | The Burlington Magazine | 1st January 2020

Hogarth was not a moralising scold. His celebrated narratives depicted London street life but not in a way that made poverty itself a moral failing. Having invented the (highly remunerative) concept of a narrative series, he documented life in this great city, without judgment. As one critic notes, “Charles Dickens is Hogarth’s only rival as a chronicler of London”.