ABSTRACT
Over his lifetime, the English artist George Cruikshank (1792–1878) witnessed the rapid industrialization and growth of his native London. The city and its environs more than tripled in population between 1800 and 1871: from 1,265,000 to 3,931,000 (Evans 405). Cruikshank observed London’s developments closely and responded with both wit and vitriol in his depictions of the city’s varied neighborhoods and inhabitants. Through his art, Cruikshank alerted viewers to many of the issues which were to define the Victorian age, particularly, the emergence and gradual acceptance of the middle class and its values of morality, ideal femininity, and domesticity.
