Marriage à-la-mode II

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Marriage à-la-mode II

William Hogarth, 1743

Oil on canvas

69.9 × 90.8 cm

National Gallery, London

This is the second canvas in the series of six satirical paintings known as Marriage à-la-mode painted by William Hogarth. The actors in this classical interior are the son of an impoverished earl, a rich merchant’s daughter and their butler.

The husband is hardly a picture of health. He has returned exhausted from a night on the town – possibly including a trip to a brothel. The dog has sniffed out what appears to be a lady’s cap in his master’s jacket pocket. Although it is only breakfast time, the young woman is already tired out. There seems to have been a session of cards at this fashionable house the night before. The butler has reached the end of his tether: the household is in chaos. He leaves the room despairingly, a clutch of bills and a receipt in his hand, and a ledger under his arm. On the wall, religious pictures are hung. However, there is a probably erotic painting behind the green curtains. A naked foot is revealed.

Both the characters and the interior testify to the deteriorating marriage: the painting above the mantelpiece shows Cupid surrounded by ruins, while the nose has been snapped off the bust, symbolizing impotence. Although this is a Classical interior, complete with columns and Italian paintings, the clock could hardly be more Rococo – a style that, to a painter like Hogarth, stood for all that was abominable, affected and false.