Grant (Charles Jameson)

, S. Gans, 1830.
An apparently scarce caricature by C.J. Grant (fl.1830-1852), commonly assumed to be named Charles Jameson, though with no firm record. This is an early composition from his known period of production, and appears to be a social satire as opposed to the radical politics he more usually projected. It depicts two figures in a delapidated garret, to our left a stocky figure wearing a blue apron and a red bonnet which has slipped down over his eyes, his sleeves rolled far up his arms, hanging by the neck from a rope tied to a roof beam. He looks to be a butcher, the ‘Hung Beef’ of the title. A sheet of paper bearing a large red heart and marks indicating text lies on the floor, presumably alluding to the cause of his suicidal distress. Walking through the door to the right, a sharp-featured skinny figure enters wearing tattered and patched white shirt and green breeches under a red waistcoat and blue bonnet. He drops his pair of tailor’s shears, indicating his contrasting trade, the livid red nose and cheeks on his horrified face making him the ‘Pickled Cabbage’ of the title. A large barrel, marked ‘Salt Tub’, stands beneath the window between them. It was a long-standing convention in comic theatre and caricature to depict butchers and tailors in opposition and rivalry, contrasting their physical traits along with the relative brutality and delicate refinement of their respective practices..
255 by 340mm (10 by 13½ inches).