The Rake's Progress (ballet) The Rake's Progress (ballet) The Rake's Progress is a short 1935 ballet based on the drawings of William Hogarth, with music by Gavin Gordon (1901-1970), choreography by Ninette de Valois, and set design by Rex Whistler. Gavin Gordon had written some earlier ballets that were not successful. By contrast, "The Rake's Progress" was an instant hit and has remained in the repertoires of a number of ballet companies. It is the only work of Gavin Gordon's that is remembered today. Gordon based his scenario for the ballet on Hogarth's series of paintings called "A Rake's Progress". These paintings influenced him
John Martin (painter) John Martin (painter) John Martin (19 July 1789 – 17 February 1854) was an English Romantic painter, engraver and illustrator. He was celebrated for his typically vast and melodramatic paintings of religious subjects and fantastic compositions, populated with minute figures placed in imposing landscapes. Martin's paintings, and the engravings made from them, enjoyed great success with the general publicin 1821 Thomas Lawrence referred to him as "the most popular painter of his day"but were lambasted by John Ruskin and other critics. Martin was born in July 1789, in a one-room cottage, at Haydon Bridge, near Hexham in Northumberland, the fourth