{"id":2024,"date":"2020-02-25T09:41:20","date_gmt":"2020-02-25T09:41:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/speccoll\/?p=2024"},"modified":"2020-04-29T14:16:20","modified_gmt":"2020-04-29T14:16:20","slug":"sir-john-tenniel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/speccoll\/2020\/02\/25\/sir-john-tenniel\/","title":{"rendered":"Sir John Tenniel – February 2020"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

28th\nFebruary 2020 marks 200 years since the birth of the illustrator and political\ncartoonist, Sir John Tenniel. Although he is best known for his illustrations\nin Alice in Wonderland, for many years he was also one of the cartoonists for\nthe magazine, Punch. He was knighted for his work in 1893.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tenniel\u2019s\nskills in drawing were largely self-taught. He did secure a place at the Royal\nAcademy of Art but left dissatisfied after just a few weeks and joined the\nClipstone Street Art Society.  Here he\nstudied all aspects of drawing, copying exhibits from the British Museum and\nwildlife from Regent\u2019s Park. However, he tended to draw from memory rather than\nfrom life. He also studied Fresco technique and worked on wood.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tenniel had\nexhibited artwork from the age of 16, and his first published illustration was\nin Hall\u2019s Book of British Ballads<\/em> in\n1842.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hall, Book of British Ballads (19th<\/sup>\nCentury Collection 821.04 HAL)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Page
Page from ‘Hall, Book of British Ballads<\/a>‘ (19th Century Collection 821.04 HAL)<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

In 1845\nTenniel obtained a commission to paint a fresco in the Upper Waiting Hall in\nthe Houses of Parliament after entering a contest. Part of the commission was\nto study fresco drawing in Munich with the other successful artists. His entry,\na sixteen-foot high cartoon The Spirit of\nJustice, <\/em>was noticed by the editor of Punch, Mark Lemon, who offered\nTenniel a job as joint cartoonist in 1850. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tenniel\u2019s\nfirst illustration in Punch<\/em> was\npublished on 8th<\/sup> February 1851, depicting Lord John Russell and\nCardinal Wiseman.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Page
Page from ‘Punch’, Volume 20<\/a> (19th Century Collection 052 PUN)<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

In 1860,\nTenniel became the political cartoonist for Punch and remained working for the\npublication, as well as illustrating in books until he retired in 1900.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1864\nTenniel met Lewis Carroll. It was suggested by his publisher that Carroll used\na professional illustrator on his recently written children\u2019s story, Alice\u2019s Adventures in Wonderland. <\/em>Tenniel\nsupplied 92 illustrations for this, as well as Carroll\u2019s later publication Through the Looking Glass <\/em>and What Alice Found There. <\/em>However, the\nrelationship became strained and Tenniel never undertook literary illustration\nagain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For all his\nlife John Tenniel lived in London. His poor eyesight as the result of a fencing\naccident as a child, eventually led to blindness in later years. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

His knighthood was a first for an illustrator or cartoonist and brought a respectability to the profession, his legacy, the 2000 images published in Punch and 92 illustrations in Lewis Carroll’s much-loved fairy tale.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

28th February 2020 marks 200 years since the birth of the illustrator and political cartoonist, Sir John Tenniel. Although he is best known for his illustrations in Alice in Wonderland, for many years he was also one of the cartoonists … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5894,"featured_media":2026,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[38,23,39,40,462,461],"class_list":["post-2024","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-treasure-of-the-month","tag-alice-in-wonderland","tag-childrens-literature","tag-illustrations","tag-lewis-carroll","tag-political-cartoonist","tag-sir-john-tenniel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/speccoll\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2024","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/speccoll\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/speccoll\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/speccoll\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5894"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/speccoll\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2024"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/speccoll\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2024\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2573,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/speccoll\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2024\/revisions\/2573"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/speccoll\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2026"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/speccoll\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2024"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/speccoll\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2024"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/speccoll\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2024"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}