Loading cart…
No products in the cart.
Save articles to your collection
Log in or create a free account, and this article will be waiting in your Private Collection.
Log in or sign up
A ByMuseum Masterpiece Series · William Hogarth, 1743
The Six Rooms of a Bad Marriage
One marriage. Six paintings. Six rooms.Every room leaves another clue.
Enter Room 1Read or listen to every room
William Hogarth's Marriage A-la-Mode is not one painting. It is a six-part story, painted around 1743 and meant to be read in order, like the rooms of a house.
A marriage begins with money on the table. A few months later, the house is full of evidence. A small mark leads to a doctor's room. A fashionable bedroom becomes a performance. A masquerade invitation leads somewhere private. In the final room, the story returns to the bargain that began it.
Each room has its own story, its own close-up details and its own narration. Walk through them in order. The clues in Room 1 are answered in Room 6.
Six doors
Open them in order. Each one is a painting, and each painting is a chapter.
1The DealThe Marriage SettlementA marriage begins as a business transaction.Open Room 1 →
2The Morning AfterThe Tête à TêteThe marriage is new, but the house already feels exhausted.Open Room 2 →
3The DoctorThe InspectionThe consequences leave the drawing room and enter another kind of room.Open Room 3 →
4The PerformanceThe ToiletteStatus has become theatre.Open Room 4 →
5The Secret RoomThe BagnioWhat was hidden can no longer stay private.Open Room 5 →
6The Final CostThe Lady's DeathThe ending returns to the deal that began the story.Open Room 6 →
1The Deal→2The Morning After→3The Doctor→4The Performance→5The Secret Room→6The Final Cost
Follow the clues
Every room leaves another clue
Hogarth hid the story in small things. Here is one from each room. Do not try to solve them yet.
Room 1The money is already on the table
Room 2A woman's cap in his pocket
Room 3A tiny mark leads to a doctor
Room 4Music, visitors and a small ticket
Room 5A candle burns. A window stands open.
Room 6A hand reaches for her ring
Room 1
Room 2
Room 3
Room 4
Room 5
Room 6money→distance→evidence→disease→performance→invitation→violence→consequence→ring
Who is who
The people in the rooms
Hogarth gave them names that tell you what they are.
Behind the series
One story, six paintings
Hogarth borrowed his title from a comedy by John Dryden, and advertised the engravings as a variety of Modern Occurrences in High Life. A few years later Samuel Johnson's Dictionary defined à la mode as "according to the fashion; a low word". That was the joke: Hogarth showed the fashionable world its own fashion, and made it look low.
He had the paintings engraved by French engravers working in London, and the prints, published in 1745, made the story famous. The paintings themselves fared worse. At his own sale in 1751 a single buyer took all six for 120 guineas. Half a century later the banker John Julius Angerstein paid a thousand guineas for them, and with his collection they helped found the National Gallery, which opened in 1824. They still hang there, together, in order.
- Artist
- William Hogarth (1697 to 1764)
- Painted
- About 1743, oil on canvas, each about 70 x 91 cm
- Where
- National Gallery, London, NG113 to NG118
- Engraved
- 1745, by Bernard Baron, Simon-François Ravenet and Gérard Scotin
- Title
- From John Dryden's comedy Marriage A-la-Mode (1672)
Start with the first agreement and follow the story room by room.
Enter Room 1Own the six rooms
Each scene is painted by hand in oil on canvas from the National Gallery original. Order one room, or the set to hang in order.
1. The Marriage SettlementHand-painted, from $259
2. The Tête à TêteHand-painted, from $259
3. The InspectionHand-painted, from $259
4. The ToiletteHand-painted, from $259
5. The BagnioHand-painted, from $259
6. The Lady's DeathHand-painted, from $259Enjoyed this story?
Save articles to your collection
Log in or create a free account, and this article will be waiting in your Private Collection.
Log in or sign up