Hogarth -- ERCOLE FARNESINO -- la linea della bellezza --

Speranza




Two didactic plates illustrating Hogarth's theory were available to subscribers either as single sheet prints or to be sewn into copies of the Analysis.

Despite his self-presentation as renegade aesthetician, in his "Analysis" and his ILLUSTRATIONS, Hogarth ultimately reiterates the BEAUTY and monumental status of familiar Roman sculptures.

Included are:

--

1) the Medici Venus (centre),

maschile:


 1) L'Apollo del Belvedere (to the left of Venus)

2) Il Laocoonte (to the rear of Venus)

3) L'Ercole Farnesiano  (center foreground)

4) L'Antino del BELVEDERE

(to the right of Venus).

Hogarth mobilized these sculptures as exemplars of what he identified as the essence of beauty:
the serpentine line.

The articulation of this line is detailed in the figures flanking the central panel of the plate.

Hogarth demonstrates this with such 'common' objects as women's corsets (figs. 1-7), of which fig. 4 is the epitome of beautiful and graceful linearity: "that sort of proportion'd, winding line, which will hereafter be call'd the precise serpentine line, or line of grace."