Ferdinand courting Miranda from William Shakespeare's 'The Tempest' (Act 1 sc. ii)

William Hogarth (London 1697 - London 1764). Oil painting on canvas, A Scene from The Tempest by William Shakespeare by William Hogarth (London 1697 - London 1764), circa 1736. Ferdinand, on the left is paying court to Miranda with her father, Prospero behind her, with half-human Caliban to the right while the spirit Ariel palys music above. It depicts Act 1, Scene ii of Shakespeare's play, The Tempest. This is an extremely important work by William Hogarth, the finest British artist of his generation. It is the first known painting of any scene from Shakespeare (the earliest illustrated edition of whose works had only been published in 1709). In keeping with Hogarth's ambitions to create an English school of ‘history-painting', the painting does not show the scene as it might have been acted on stage, but as an imagined reality, complete with the aerial intervention so characteristic of the Baroque style. Nostell Priory, West Yorkshire (Accredited Museum)