The Worship of Bacchus. George Cruikshank. 1861-62. Oil on canvas. Support: 2360 × 4060 mm; frame: 2815 × 4520 × 145 mm. Collection: Tatt, presented by R.E. Lofft and friends 1869. Reference N00795. Image released by the gallery under Creative Commons CC-BY-NC-ND (3.0 Unported). Downloaded and formatted by Jacqueline Banerjee. [Click on the image to enlarge it.]

Commentary by Christoper Holden (1999), on the Tate website

The technique for the painting is very straight forward. The images were initially drawn in pencil on the priming, which remains visible where the paint is thin. Over this there is a thin under- painting mainly in brown and and yellow-brown washes of oil paint. On top of this the images have been more clearly defined in thicker paint and colours that have brush markings in many places. The pigments identified are lead white, chrome yellow, vermillion, cobalt blue, Mars brown and reddish Mars brown. Impastoed highlights of white or tinted white have been generally applied with vigorous squiggles, dabs and blobs and are a distictive feature adding liveliness to the paint and composition.

Links to related material

• William Frith's daughter Cissie describes the impact of the painting
• George Cruikshank's The Bottle (1847)
• George Cruikshank's The Drunkard's Children (1848)
• Temperance, Teetotalism, and Addiction in the Nineteenth Century
• Addiction in the Nineteenth Century
• Drunkedness and the ease of obtaining alcohol
• Alcohol and Alcoholism in Victorian England
• The Gin-Shop
• "Great is thy power, O Gin" — Reynold's sermon on the harm it does to the poor
• London Gin Shops

Bibliography

"George Cruikshank: The Worship of Bacchus, 1860–2." Tate. Web. 30 December 2022.

Created 30 December 2022