What was Modern? (1910-1914)

Tom Titt's Cartoons of London

Tom Titt, New Oxford Street and Holborn (NA 14.12, Jan 22, 1914)

Although The New Age provided a vital forum for debate about aesthetic issues, the majority of the articles published there treated political and social matters confronting the contemporary Londoner. Unsurprisingly, most images printed in the magazine were not intended as artworks, but as commentary on current affairs. Between 1910 and 1914, nearly every issue included a cartoon on its final page. Usually these satirized individuals discussed elsewhere in that week’s number, but from November, 1913, to February, 1914, the magazine instead featured a series of TOM TITT’S CARTOONS OF LONDON. These images employed visual rhetorics taken from the artworks being reproduced in the magazine at the time, using futurism’s patterned repetition to invoke movement, or heavy dark lines reminiscent of Walter Sickert’s style to reflect upon the city that housed the magazine. In Titt’s cartoons, the city is presented not as an idyllic space for aesthetic contemplation but as a site of chaotic activity and relentless commerce. London is treated not as appropriate subject matter for aesthetic elevation, but as the site where high art meets satire.