Kay, JOHN

Kay, JOHN, a famous Scotch caricaturist, was born near Dalkeith in 1742, and from an early age practised prosperously as a barber in Edinburgh, until in 1785 he opened a print-shop for the sale of miniatures and sketches of local celebrities etched by himself. He died February 21, 1826. Kay's portraits have but little artistic merit beyond a genuine humour, yet he possessed somehow the trick of catching the likenesses of his subjects, and the series forms a unique and invaluable record of the social life of the Edinburgh of his time. His portraits were collected and published as A Series of Original Portraits and Caricature Etchings by the late John Kay, with Biographical Sketches and Illustrative Anecdotes (2 vols. quarto, 1838; new ed. with additional plates, 2 vols. 1877).