- Museum number
- 1868,0808.6503
- Title
- Object: The fashionable mamma, - or - the convenience of modern dress.
- Description
-
A fashionably dressed woman sits (left) in profile to the right, on an upright chair, while a carriage waits for her. Her loose dress, high to the neck, has two embroidered slits to reveal the breasts. A pretty, buxom nurse holds out an infant, who eagerly sucks the breast thus conveniently laid bare. She wears a turban with two erect feathers, and short sleeves; her gloved right hand holds a closed fan. On the wall behind her is a large picture, 'Maternal Love', a seated woman suckles an infant. Through a high sash-window is seen a corner of the waiting coach, a footman holding open the door, a fat coachman on the box. The coach, hammer-cloth, and the lady's chair are decorated with a baron's coronet. A patterned carpet covers the floor. 15 February 1796
Hand-coloured etching and stipple
- Production date
- 1796
- Dimensions
-
Height: 350 millimetres
-
Width: 247 millimetres
- $Inscriptions
-
- Curator's comments
- (Description and comment from M.Dorothy George, 'Catalogue of Political and Personal Satires in the British Museum', VII, 1942)
The superseding of the wet-nurse was a fashion which derived from the doctrines of Rousseau; cf. BMSat 8901. See BMSat 8896, &c.
Grego, 'Gillray', p. 209 (small copy). Wright and Evans, No. 415. Reprinted, 'G.W.G.', 1830. Reproduced, Fuchs, p. 283.
- Location
- Not on display
- Exhibition history
-
2001 Jun-Sep, London, Tate Britain, 'Gillray and the Art of Caricature'
2002 Jan-Mar, Newcastle, Hatton Gall, Followers of Fashion
2002 Jun-Jul, Belfast, Ulster Mus, Followers of Fashion
2002 Aug-Sep, Nottingham, Djanogly AG, Followers of Fashion
2002/3 Dec-Feb, Brighton MAG, Followers of Fashion
2003 Apr-Jun, Braintree District Mus, Followers of Fashion
2005 Mar-Jun, Bath, Holburne Mus of Art, Pictures of Innocence
2009 Jan-Mar, BM, Room 90, Love and Marriage
- Acquisition date
- 1868
- Department
- Prints and Drawings
- Registration number
- 1868,0808.6503
