Title: Before After

Artist: William Hogarth

Before After About 1730–31 William Hogarth English, 1697–1764 Oil on canvas These two scenes tell an uncomfortable story of sexual conquest. In the first, a man aggressively pursues a woman, grabbing at her clothes as she tries to push him away. In the second, with the man's lust now sated, he shows indifference to her attention. Hogarth intended these paintings as a witty and biting comment on human nature and as a provocative response to the anodyne images of courtship popular in early eighteenth-century art. The paintings' humor, however, has soured with time. To the contemporary viewer they likely offer a reminder of injustices perpetrated against women and of deep-seated power imbalances between the sexes.