Cockney-Sportsmen
London: H. Humphrey, 1800. Item #04975
Gillray's Masterpiece of Sporting Satire
A Complete Contemporary Hand-Colored Suite in Exceptional Original Condition
GILLRAY, James. Cockney-Sportsmen. London: H[annah] Humphrey, November 12th, 1800.
Oblong folio (13 1/2 x 19 1/8 inches; 342 x 485 mm. Plate mark 10 1/8 x 14 1/8 inches; 254 x 358 mm.). Four magnificent hand-colored soft-ground etched aquatint plates.
Chemised in a felt-lined half black morocco over red cloth clamshell case, spine with five raised bands, ruled and lettered in gilt in compartments. A very fine set.
Few series by James Gillray so perfectly combine his extraordinary gifts as draftsman, social observer, and comic genius as Cockney Sportsmen. Published by Hannah Humphrey on 12 November 1800, the four large hand-colored aquatints form a brilliantly sustained satire on fashionable Londoners whose aspirations to country life vastly exceed their abilities. Together they rank among the finest sporting caricatures of the Georgian period.
Complete contemporary sets have always been uncommon. Individual plates have long circulated separately, and surviving examples have frequently suffered trimming, restoration, washing, or other attempts at improvement. The present suite is therefore remarkable not merely for its completeness but for its exceptional state of preservation.
Each sheet retains its full original margins without trimming into the plate mark, preserving the prints exactly as issued. The contemporary hand-coloring remains fresh and vibrant throughout. The paper has never been washed or restored, and there are no repaired tears, fills, retouching, or other condition issues. All four impressions are printed on matching paper from the same contemporary issue, creating a uniformity seldom encountered in surviving sets.
Viewed together, the sequence unfolds almost cinematically. Gillray follows his hapless Cockney sportsmen through a succession of increasingly disastrous encounters with the supposed pleasures of the countryside, exposing with unfailing wit the gulf between metropolitan pretension and rural reality. His powers of observation extend well beyond his human subjects: the horses, dogs, game, and landscape are rendered with remarkable vitality, while every plate rewards close examination with an abundance of comic detail.
Although celebrated principally as Britain's greatest political caricaturist, Gillray was equally unmatched as a satirist of manners. In Cockney Sportsmen he transformed the conventions of the sporting print into a work of sustained comic invention, producing a suite that is as visually compelling today as when it first appeared more than two centuries ago.
An exceptionally rare opportunity to acquire this celebrated series complete, in contemporary color, and in such untouched original condition.
The Plates:
1. "Cockney Sportsmen Marking Game" Nov. 12th, 1800.
2. "Cockney Sportsmen Shooting Flying" Nov. 12th, 1800.
3. "Cockney Sportsmen Recharging" Nov. 12th, 1800.
4. "Cockney Sportsmen Finding A Hare" Nov. 12th, 1800.
We know of two other complete sets of this exceptionally rare suite of plates - The National Portrait Gallery (London, UK) and Bobins. The Exotic and the Beautiful vol. IV, 1339.
According to OCLC there is just one complete set of the four prints located in libraries & institutions worldwide, The Morgan Library & Museum (NY, USA). That set appears to be uncolored.
Two of the prints "…Shooting Flying" & "…Finding A Hare" are held at the Yale University Library (CT, USA) - these two prints are hand-colored.
Wright & Evans, 492-495; Bobins IV, 1339.
Price: $16,500.00