The art of the caricature and criticism of modernity

In the setting provided by The Grotesque Factor exhibition, the deserved importance of caricature was an invitation to carry on exploring, in three sequences, which were of special significance for caricature’s constitution as a genre in modern art. Over three afternoon sessions lasting three hours each, we analysed both the social and cultural context and the most relevant series and motifs in the works of William Hogarth, Honoré Daumier and George Grosz.

During these sessions we alternated between an understanding of the historical setting corresponding to each one of the artists, and the observation of certain details, foundes in their images, which distinguishes the singularity of each artist. At the same time, tracking these three names, which in turn mark three well-defined sequences in the history of Europe, enabled us to trace continuities and similarities between the artistic mediums, and also between the moral and political attitudes displayed by Hogarth, Daumier and Grosz. As well as this, we were able to detect the thresholds marking where there is discontinuity and divergence between them, and see what each one of them, and their times, provided us with in the way of new offerings.

The seminar was led in Spanish by Luis Puelles, associate professor of Aesthetics and Theory of the Arts at the University of Malaga, and academic consultant for The Grotesque Factor exhibition.