Art - James Gillray

The last decade of the 18th century was a period in which the traditional civil liberties of the British were being eroded by a government using the public’s fear of foreigners to increase their power. (Plus ça change) Tory Prime Minister Pitt the Younger, worried that the contagious mood that had swept France into revolution would transfer across the channel, introduced a series of counter-revolutionary measures, including the suspension of Habeas Corpus, to curtail the freedom of expression of his opponents. One of his main allies was caricaturist James Gillray, who viciously attacked Pitt’s Whig opposition, in particular Charles James Fox, parodying his defence of civil liberties as support for the ‘monstrosity across the channel’ - the French revolution. Another opponent of Pitt lambasted by Gillray’s acerbic nib was ‘Tommy’ Paine, revolutionary apologist and author of The Rights of Man.

This exhibition shows a series of political cartoons by Gillray, drawn between 1791 and 1806, which had a huge impact on the public’s notions of the opposition to Pitt’s reforms. They are brilliant works of art: an accompanying text sets them in context to make a visit to this exhibition an informative history lesson as well as a profound aesthetic experience. It is a well-known maxim that history repeats itself, and we are again finding ourselves in a period when civil liberties are being curtailed by a government using fear of terror to push retrospective laws. This, then, is a timely exhibition. AL