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Design for a plate to J. C. Lavater’s, ‘Essays on Physiognomy’, translated by Henry Hunter, London, 1789–1798, vol.III.i., p.107. Lavater describes these as ‘atrocious characters’. He begins to analyse them in terms of temperament but then exclaims ‘how little is conveyed by this enumeration! These represent four worthless men who appear to accuse, before our Lord, the woman taken in adultery... All these would have given their suffrages to condemn Calas to the wheel: the first with a stupid and brutal hardness of heart, the second with a sanguinary phlegm, the third with seeming indifference, the fourth with an obstinate and deliberate cruelty’.
Title
Four Physiognomies Expressing Evil Characters
Date
c.1792
Medium
pencil on paper (?)
Measurements
H 9.7 x W 18.9 cm
Accession number
29838i
Acquisition method
presumed to be part of the collection formed by Henry S. Wellcome
Work type
Drawing
Wellcome Collection
183 Euston Road, London, Greater London NW1 2BE England
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