Portret van Joseph Mawbey 1765 - 1779

This print by John Dixon portrays Sir Joseph Mawbey, likely dating to the late 18th century. It was made using a technique called mezzotint, a painstaking process of shading an image on a copper plate to create velvety tones. Look closely, and you can see the subtle gradations of light and shadow achieved through this method. The entire plate would have been roughened with a tool called a rocker before the image was created by selectively burnishing areas to create lighter tones. This was incredibly labor-intensive, requiring great skill to execute well. Mezzotint was a popular method for reproducing paintings at the time, making art accessible to a wider audience, and expanding the market for imagery during a period of political reform. In its own way, this print embodies democratization, a concept we see reflected in the book Mawbey is holding, open to a chapter "On Government." This work serves as a potent reminder that materials, making, and context are all essential to understanding its full meaning.