2-871-252 - Shirley Markham Collection/Heritage Images

The Pretty Bar Maid, c1780-1825. 'In Rowlandson's work, on the one hand, there is a delicate delineation of exaggerated commonplaceness and, on the other, sensitive realism. Alteration, distortion, and enlargement of feature and body are often employed beyond reason, but in the hands of Rowlandson there seems to be an unseen force to indicate the limits to which he could go - to however eccentric, grotesque, or fanciful lengths his imagination might lead him. His characters seem true to type; he was able to animate them, whether they were humorous, frivolous, ironic, or bitter'. From "The Watercolour Drawings of Thomas Rowlandson from the Albert H. Wiggin Collection in the Boston Public Library" with commentary by Arthur W. Heintzelman. [Watson-Guptill Publications, Inc., New York, 1947]