"A Hasty Judge", Sir Arthur Kekewich, January 24, 1895

"A hasty judge",  Sir Arthur kekewich, Vanity Fair, 1895

Image shows a rectangular colour lithograph of a white middle-aged male. The depiction is set in a courtroom, with the man sitting behind a wooden judge’s bench, upon which is a sheaf of paper which he writes on with a white feather quill. He wears grey and black robes with a white shirt and cravat, a white periwig, and has prominent white muttonchop facial hair. Two upturned books are stacked next to him on the left, with red bindings and white and red page edges. A red curtain hangs below the bench. Text appears written over the bench that reads ‘spy’. Above the illustration, text on the left reads: ‘VANITY FAIR’ and to the right: ‘Jan 24. 1895’. Below, to the right: ‘Vincent Brooks, Day & Son, Lith.’ and a subtitle to the centre: ‘ “A hasty Judge”’. Beneath this, in added handwritten pencil: ‘Sir A Kekewich Exeter’.

Vanity Fair, founded in 1868, was a society magazine that became known for its distinctive type of satirical portraiture. Every week, caricatures were published of many leading public figures from the later Victorian period using the relatively new process of chromolithography. The appearance of ‘spy’ within the illustration refers to the pseudonym used by the caricaturist, Sir Leslie Ward (1851-1922) during his tenure as a Vanity Fair portraitist. He worked in watercolour, and his images were then turned into chromolithographs for publication. The illustrations were then often reproduced on higher quality paper and sold as prints, such as this one held by the DEI, which was Number 44 in a series called “Judges”.

Ward was born to artistic parents, the painters Edward Matthew Ward and Henrietta Ward, and later studied at the Royal Academy. He drew 1, 325 cartoons for Vanity Fair between 1873 and 1911, latterly working more sympathetically towards his subjects creating what he called “characteristic portraits” instead of heavily stylised caricatures. The subject of the illustration, Sir Arthur Kekewich (1832-1907), was an English barrister and High Court judge, who worked in office between 1886 and 1907. He was born at Peamore House in the parish of Exminster, where he is buried, near Exeter, Devon, to an old Devonshire family. A description of him appears in Sidney Lee’s Dictionary of National Biography, which cites personal anecdotes published in The Times, 23 November 1907, by a source named J. B. A:

“Most kindly and courteous in private life, he was apt to be irritable on the bench. His judgments were appealed with uncomplimentary frequency…Kekewich was a strong churchman and conservative. A man of fine physique and active habits, a keen shot and fisherman, he became in his later years an enthusiastic golf player.”

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