C
Caricature
Caricature visually accentuates and mocks the faults of the powerful, corrupt, pompous and vain. It mercilessly ridicules and pillories politicians, royalty and the famous. Jonathan Swift, author of Gulliver’s Travels, advised that politicians should be repeatedly pinched, pricked and punched to remind them of their forgotten promises; caricatures miss no opportunity to attack targets by transforming them into bloated pigs, preening peacocks, incontinent drunkards and ravenous cannibals.
‘Caricature is always Us against Them. The joke is shared; so is the hate.’
William Feaver, writer
‘The underdogs get to laugh at those who think they’re the top dogs.’
John Baxter, artist
James Gillray, An excrescence – a fungus; alias a toadstool ...
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