Cunicularii, or The Wise Men of Godliman in Consultation 1726

Curator: "Cunicularii, or The Wise Men of Godliman in Consultation"… Hogarth, 1726. Isn't it a bizarre scene etched on this print? It feels like walking into a fever dream from the 18th century. Editor: Absolutely. It’s quite unsettling, but also rather fascinating. All the figures crowding around, the woman in distress… what on earth is happening here? Curator: Well, Hogarth being Hogarth, it’s a satire! It's actually about the Mary Toft affair, a wild story where a woman claimed to be giving birth to rabbits. Can you imagine the frenzy that caused? This print is Hogarth's jab at the so-called experts and gullible public who believed it. Editor: Rabbits! Wow. That context really changes things. But how does he get this message across through the image itself? I mean, aside from all the… rabbits. Curator: Look at their faces! Each is a study in either intense scrutiny, outright fraud, or naive wonder. And the "experts" are literally groping for answers in a place where no answers can be found, ahem, symbolically speaking. It's his masterful use of line, that sharp detail, which exposes their absurdity. Do you think he felt sorry for them? Editor: Hardly! I see that. He's ridiculing them. But do you think there is something deeper than just an expose of this singular fraud, here? Curator: Perhaps the work gently satirizes our perennial search for spectacle over sense? Maybe it points at the enduring allure of sensationalism that he both loathes and exploits! That might be something, eh? Editor: Definitely gives you a lot to think about, not just about the 18th century, but today, too. Curator: Exactly! And it makes you wonder, doesn’t it, where will the Hogarth of our time be found, wielding line and irony with such delicious, wicked skill?