A Tax Payer

Location

Country: UK
City: London
Place: Government Art Collection

Henry Thomas Alken was born in Soho, London; the son of artist and printmaker Samuel Alken. His brothers Sefferein and Samuel became sporting artists, while George was a designer and lithographer. Alken studied under his father, followed by miniaturist John Thomas Barber Beaumont. In 1809 he married Maria Gordon of Ipswich, Suffolk, and remained in Ipswich for a time. His five children were all born there. In 1813 his first sporting prints were published. He went on to produce numerous designs for sporting printsellers, using the pseudonym Ben Tally Ho for satirical subjects. He was also a prolific printmaker himself and wrote books on engraving. At his death, he was living in relative poverty with his unmarried daughter in Highgate.

Places

Subjects

barrel, quill, pen, smoking pipe, fish, herring, bull, sideburns, man, 19th century costume, coat, shirt, stockings, waistcoat, trousers, wig, scarf, shoe, candle, bottle, plate, potato, working class, John Bull, fireplace, window, domestic interior, table (as Subject)

Materials & Techniques

coloured etching

Artist

Henry Thomas Alken (1785 - 1851)
Johann Christian Zeitter ( - 1862)

Title

A Tax Payer

Date

1830

Medium

Coloured etching

Dimensions

height: 30.20 cm, width: 21.70 cm

Acquisition

Transferred from HM Revenue and Customs, February 2013

Inscription

inside image: [lower right] Political Economy

Provenance

Inland Revenue, Somerset House; transferred to GAC 2013

GAC number

15561