Harry Furniss
 
 

 
PARLIAMENTARY SKETCHES THE PUBLISHED COLLECTION IN LIMITED EDITION
 
 
01 "The Grand Old Marionette ; or The Home Rule Dance", Punch February 18th 1893, p.83, 18 x 24cms, and the Prime Minister of the Day pulled hither and thither by the political turbulence in Ireland where Republicans were seeking freedom from British rule. One of Furniss best images and well drawn with a neatly integrated darkened plain of a background. Furniss was celebrated as a caricaturist for extending Gladstone's collars to absurd lengths.
 
 
02 Parliamentary Views; the Egyptian Question. 10 x 18cms. Punch February 23 1884, p.95. Marvellously sustained idea of interpreting the House of Commons in a qausi-Egyptian way, with the Mr.Gladstone, the Prime Minister's collars assuming their Furniss hallmark shape, and receiving additional Egyptian decoration. The Speaker's Eye as Horus.
 
 
03 Hardly more archaelogically correct, "The House of Commons, from a design by a Japanese artist." Punch November 8th 1884 p.227. Japanese design influenced British taste from c1857. By 1884 it was distinctly vieux chose. Nice touches abound. The omni-present Furniss beetle; Gladstone on his box marked GOM, the Grand Old Man.
 
04 a dramatic panoramic and multi-layered image of The Jerrybuilding Jabberwock , one of Harry Furniss best for strength of drawing (often he was careless or resorting too easily to pastiche). A real feeling of the drab smoky despoilation of the land by the City. Punch October 8th 1892, 17 x 19cms.
 
 

 

recent scans 2006

TO MY FELLOW STUDENTS

PARLIAMENTARY VIEWS KEY DRAWINGS