Bow Street Office: An Original 19th C. Hand-Colored Engraving by Thomas Rowlandson From Microcosm of London, 1808

Description

An early 19th century print entitled "Bow Street Office", an illustration (Plate 11) from "The Microcosm of London", published in … more An early 19th century print entitled "Bow Street Office", an illustration (Plate 11) from "The Microcosm of London", published in London in 1808 by R. Ackermann's Repository of Arts. The scene was created by one of the most famous British satirists and caricaturists of the late 18th and early 19th centuries' Georgian Period, Thomas Rowlandson, who drew the figures, while Augustus Charles Pugin drew the architecture. The plate was then created by Hill, Stadler and Bluck using a combination of aquatint and etching and was then hand colored with watercolor. Scenes illustrated in "The Microcosm of London" gives an accurate and often comical view of everyday life in London during the Regency Period of the early 19th century. While Pugin’s excellent architectural drawings capture the size and shape of the exterior as well as the interior of London’s principal buildings, Thomas Rowlandson’s insightful and often whimsical and satirical view of the city's inhabitants depicts the color and vitality of the late Georgian society, both rich and poor alike.
The print is held in the collections of many museums, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the British Museum. It is presented here in a black wood frame with gold trim along its inner and outer margins with a pale mint green colored mat. There is a tiny tear at the edge of the left margin, but the print is otherwise in very good condition. There are small frame defects. less