The New Crusade.

“The Anti-Slavery Conference opened in Brussels on November 18. All the plenipotentiaries were present.”—Times.

Sir John Tenniel (1820–1914)

Punch magazine, November 30, 1889, page 259.

Dim. 11.25 x 7.5” (28.5 x 19 cm)

Sight. 8.25 x 6.12” (21 x 15 cm)

Condition. General age toning, slight foxing. Initialed lower left.

The reproduction from Punch magazine is not included. 

The new Lord Mayor of London, W. R. Cotton, caused diplomatic issues when he did not invite the representatives of Paraguay, Honduras, and Costa Rica (pictured) to the Guildhall Banquet based on a report of the Foreign Loans Commission but invited Turkey (pictured) and other countries with outstanding loans. From The Globe (November 1, 1875, page 4), ?If Costa Rica, Paraguay, San Domingo, and Honduras be unworthy of admission within the charmed circle of civic festivities, on what ground is entrance allowed to Spain, Greece, and Turkey??

John Tenniel was an English illustrator, graphic humourist and political cartoonist prominent in the second half of the 19th century. An alumnus of the Royal Academy of Arts in London, he was knighted for artistic achievements in 1893, the first such honour ever bestowed on an illustrator or cartoonist.

Tenniel is remembered mainly as the principal political cartoonist for Punch magazine for over 50 years and for his illustrations to Lewis Carroll?s Alice?s Adventures in Wonderland (1865) and Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There (1871). Tenniel?s detailed black-and-white drawings remain the definitive depiction of the Alice characters, with comic book illustrator and writer Bryan Talbot stating, ?Carroll never describes the Mad Hatter: our image of him is pure Tenniel.?

Early life

Tenniel was born in Bayswater, West London, to John Baptist Tenniel, a fencing and dancing master of Huguenot descent, and Eliza Maria Tenniel. Tenniel had five siblings; two brothers and three sisters. Tenniel was a quiet and introverted person, both as a boy and as an adult. He was content to remain firmly out of the limelight and seemed unaffected by competition or change. His biographer Rodney Engen wrote that Tenniel?s ?life and career was that of the supreme gentlemanly outside, living on the edge of respectability.?

In 1840, Tenniel, while practising fencing, received a serious eye wound from his father?s foil, which had accidentally lost its protective tip. Over the years, Tenniel gradually lost sight in his right eye; he never told his father of the severity of the wound, as he did not wish to upset him further.

In spite of a tendency towards high art, Tenniel was already known and appreciated as a humourist. His early companionship with Charles Keene fostered his talent for scholarly caricature.

Training

Tenniel became a student of the Royal Academy of Arts in 1842 by probation; he was admitted because he had made enough copies of classical sculptures to fill the necessary admission portfolio. So it was here that Tenniel returned to his earlier independent education.

While Tenniel?s more formal training at the Royal Academy and other institutions was beneficial in nurturing his artistic ambitions, he disagreed with the school?s teaching methods, and so he set about educating himself. He studied classical sculptures through painting. However, he was frustrated in this because he lacked instruction in drawing.Tenniel would draw the classical statues at London?s Townley Gallery, copy illustrations from books of costumes and armour in the British Museum, and draw animals from the zoo in Regent?s Park, as well as actors from London theatres, which he drew from the pits. These studies taught Tenniel to love detail, yet he became impatient in his work and was happiest when he could draw from memory. Though he had a photographic memory, it undermined his early formal training and restricted his artistic ambitions.

Punch

As the influential result of his position as the chief cartoon artist for Punch, Tenniel remained a witness to Britain?s sweeping changes. He furthered political and social reform through satirical, often radical, and at times vitriolic images of the world. At Christmas 1850 he was invited by Mark Lemon to fill the position of joint cartoonist (with John Leech) on Punch, having been selected on the strength of recent illustrations to Aesop?s Fables. He contributed his first drawing in the initial letter appearing on p. 224, vol. xix. This was entitled ?Lord Jack the Giant Killer? and showed Lord John Russell assailing Cardinal Wiseman.

Tenniel?s first characteristic lion appeared in 1852, as did his first obituary cartoon. Gradually he took over altogether the weekly drawing of the political ?big cut,? which Leech was happy to cede to Tenniel in order to restrict himself to his pictures of life and character.

In 1861, Tenniel was offered Leech?s position at Punch, as political cartoonist, but Tenniel still maintained a sense of decorum and restraint in the heated social and political issues of the day.[17] When Leech died in 1864, Tenniel continued their work alone, rarely missing a single week.

His task was to follow the wilful choices of his Punch editors, who probably took their cue from The Times and would have felt the suggestions of political tensions from Parliament as well. Tenniel?s work could be scathing in effect. The restlessness in the issues of working-class radicalism, labour, war, economy, and other national themes were the targets of Punch, which in turn settled the nature of Tenniel?s subjects. When examined separately from the book illustrations he did over time, Tenniel?s work at Punch alone, expressing decades of editorial viewpoints, often controversial and socially sensitive, was created to echo the voices of the British public. Tenniel drew 2,165 cartoons for Punch, a liberal and politically active publication that mirrored the Victorian public?s mood for liberal social changes; thus Tenniel, in his cartoons, represented for years the conscience of the British majority.

Eye for detail

After the 1850s, Tenniel?s style was modernised to incorporate more detail in backgrounds and in figures. The inclusion of background details corrected the previously weak Germanic staging of his illustrations. Tenniel?s more precisely-designed illustrations depicted specific moments of time, locale and individual character instead of just generalised scenes.

In addition to a change in specificity of background, Tenniel developed a new interest in human types, expressions, and individualised representation, something that would carry over into his illustrations of Wonderland. Referred to by many as theatricality, this hallmark of Tenniel?s style probably stemmed from his earlier interest in caricature. In Tenniel?s first years on Punch he developed this caricaturist?s interest in the uniqueness of persons and things, almost giving a human like personality to the objects in the environment. For example, a comparison of one of John Everett Millais?s illustrations of a girl in a chair with Tenniel?s illustration of Alice in a chair shows clearly that Millais?s chair is just a prop, whereas Tenniel?s chair possesses a menacing and towering presence.

An ultimate tribute came to an elderly Tenniel as he was knighted for public service in 1893 by Queen Victoria. It was the first such honour ever bestowed on an illustrator or cartoonist. His fellows saw his knighthood as gratitude for ?raising what had been a fairly lowly profession to an unprecedented level of respectability.? With his knighthood, Tenniel elevated the social status of the black-and-white illustrator, and sparked a new sense of recognition of his profession. When he retired in January 1901, Tenniel was honoured with a farewell banquet (on 12 June), at which Arthur Balfour, then Leader of the House of Commons, presided, and described Tenniel as ?a great artist and a great gentleman?.

Tenniel died of natural causes at his home in West Kensington, London, on 25 February 1914, three days before his 94th birthday. His funeral was held on 2 March 1914 and he was buried in Kensal Green Cemetery, London.

Legacy

The Punch historian M. H. Spielmann, who knew Tenniel, wrote that the political clout contained in his Punch cartoons was capable of ?swaying parties and people, too?.  Two days after his death, The Daily Graphic recalled how Tenniel ?had an influence on the political feeling of this time which is hardly measurable.... While Tenniel was drawing them (his subjects), we always looked to the Punch cartoon to crystallize the national and international situation, and the popular feeling about it?and never looked in vain.? This social influence resulted from the weekly publishing of his political cartoons over 50 years, whereby Tenniel?s fame allowed for a want and need for his particular illustrative work, away from the newspaper. Tenniel became not only one of Victorian Britain?s most published illustrators, but as a Punch cartoonist one of the ?supreme social observers? of British society and an integral component of a powerful journalistic force. [Wikipedia]

Until late in his career, Tenniel?s cartoons for Punch were engraved on wood. The artist would first draw his images with a hard pencil on paper, then the engraver, usually Joseph Swain, would flesh out the characters and background for reproduction.