James Gillray (1756 - 1815)

James Gillray

James Gillray was a British artist and caricaturist.

James Gillray was the most popular caricaturist of the second half of the 18th century. From about 1775 to 1810, he created about 1,000 political and social caricatures, often violent and even obscene. These include finished portrait drawings of the rich and famous, comic caricatures of bumbling people, and satirical caricatures of British political and social life during the Napoleonic era.

James Gillray's political cartoons are a historical record of the latter part of George III's reign. They were widely circulated in Britain and Europe and were produced as pamphlets. They sharply ridicule George III, the Queen, the Prince of Wales, Charles James Fox, Edmund Burke, William Pitt and Napoleon.