Marriage à-la-mode. Plate 1. The marriage settlement

The first of a series of six engravings, based on paintings by William Hogarth (1743-45). The original paintings are in the National Gallery, London. Hogarth commissioned three French expatriate specialist engravers (in this print Louis Gerard Scotin), as they were the finest practitioners of the medium in mid-18th century London. The importation of French fashions, manners and morals, which Hogarth considered effete and affected, is also satirised in the series.

In Marriage à-la-mode, Hogarth challenges the ideal view that the rich live virtuous lives with a heavy satire on the notion of arranged marriages. In each piece, he shows the young couple and their family and acquaintances at their worst: engaging in affairs, drinking, gambling, and numerous other vices. This is widely regarded as his finest project, certainly the best example of his serially-planned story cycles.

In the first of the series, The Marriage Settlement, Hogarth shows an arranged marriage between the son of bankrupt Earl Squanderfield and the daughter of a wealthy but miserly city merchant. Work on the Earl's new Palladian mansion, visible through the window, has stopped and a usurer negotiates payment for further construction at the centre table. The gouty Earl proudly points to a picture of his family tree, rising from William the Conqueror. The son views himself in the mirror, showing where his interests in the matter lie. The distraught merchant's daughter is consoled by the lawyer Silvertongue while polishing her wedding ring. Even the faces on the walls appear to have misgivings. Two dogs chained to each other in the corner mirror the situation of the young couple.

See also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marriage_%C3%A0-la-mode_(Hogarth)

Dr Mark Stocker, Curator Historical International Art                                 November 2016