Part 3: People

Retford, Kate

I don't have an account

Create an account to save content, highlights, and notes to your personal bookshelf.

If you do not have access to the eBook content on the A&AePortal via an institutional subscription, you can purchase an individual subscription from your account. Learn more about subscriptions.

Purchase a subscription

Save Cite Share

Free

Part 3: People

Kate Retford

The Conversation Piece: Making Modern Art in Eighteenth-Century Britain

Part 3: People

Author

Kate Retford

PublisherPaul Mellon Centre

Stable URL: https://aaeportal.com/?id=-23274

Part 3: People

6. ‘Familys Done in Familiar Case in Groups’

7. ‘The Conversation of a Well Chosen Friend’

8. ‘Light Incidents’

Book details

BOOKThe Conversation Piece: Making Modern Art in Eighteenth-Century Britain

Kate Retford

https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00340

Stable URL: https://aaeportal.com/?id=-23263

Pioneered by William Hogarth (1697–1764) and his peers in the early 18th century, and then revitalized by Johan Zoffany (1733–1810), the conversation piece was an innovative mode of portraiture, depicting groups posed in landscape or domestic settings. These artists grappled with creating complex multi-figured compositions and intricate narratives, filling their paintings with representations of socially, nationally, and temporally precise customs. Paying particular attention to the vibrant (and at times fabricated) interior and exterior settings in these works, Kate Retford discusses the various ways that the conversation piece engaged with the rich material culture of Georgian Britain. The book also explores how these portraits served a wide array of interests and concerns among familial networks and larger social groups. From codifying performances of politeness to engaging in cross-cultural exchanges, the conversation piece was a complex and nuanced expression of a multifaceted society.

PRAISE FOR THE BOOK:
". . . it provides not only an extremely satisfying account of conversation pieces but makes significant contributions to our understanding of British art and the eighteenth century more broadly. Essential." — Craig Hanson, Choice

*This eBook is available exclusively on the A&AePortal.*

Author

Kate Retford

PublisherPaul Mellon Centre

Print publication date October 2017 (out of print)

Print ISBN 9780300194807

EISBN 9780300272888

Illustrations 232

Print Status out of print

Publisher (out of print)

WorldCat

Google Books

Base text size -

Chapter images ()