A Parrot

Charles Bennett

1857

Hand-coloured wood engraving.

6 x 5½ inches

Illustration for Bennett’s Shadows, no page number.

Social and sexual display and its relationship to the courtship rituals of animals is a recurring motif in Bennett’s art. The vanity of birds, notably in the form of peacocks and parrots, is a favourite image. Self-indulgent old age is prime material, here cruelly mocked in an image of vanity where there should be dignity.

Scanned image and text by Simon Cooke.

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