The Manchester Art Treasures Exhibition of 1857

 

The 1851 Great Exhibition at Crystal Palace - or to give it its full title: The Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of all Nations - had been a celebration of British (and world) manufacturing, invention, science, progress, culture. 

Colonialism, which had given Britain (and other European nations) access to resources, cheap labour, and bigger markets, had led to a fantastic growth and the feeling that the Empire was only going to get bigger and better.

Liverpool grew fat on the Slave Trade, but it was not just slaves that Liverpool merchants made their money on. The triangular trade between Europe, Africa and the Americas meant profits for the merchants on each leg. Even after the slave trade was abolished, slavery continued, with Britons continuing to own slaves until the 1830s and slavery being the business model for the US until the Civil War. The crops imported by the Liverpool traders, like cotton and sugar, couldn’t have been produced at that scale without slave labour.

Excerpt from Manchester from the Cliff, Higher Broughton by William  Wyld, 1830

These crops were imported through Liverpool and then disappeared off into the hinterland of Lancashire, and over the Pennines to Yorkshire. A prime beneficiary was  Manchester whose population had grown from 95,000 at the beginning of the 19th century to 455,000 by the mid point. While Liverpool was Britain’s Second City, Manchester was described as Hell on Earth (by Engels) on account of its dark, Satanic mills and factories.

Manchester Examiner and Times, 24 May, 1856

But the Manchester merchants felt that they could put on a show to prove that they were as cultured as the next man. In 1856 a decision was made to host a great arts exhibition and 13 months later that ambition was realised, with the opening of the Art Treasures Exhibition.

The exhibition's central hall

The Art Treasures of Great Britain was an exhibition of fine art held in Manchester, England, from 5 May to 17 October 1857. It remains the largest art exhibition to be held in the UK, possibly in the world, with over 16,000 works on display. It attracted over 1.3 million visitors in the 142 days it was open, about four times the population of Manchester at that time, many of whom visited on organised railway excursions. Its selection and display of artworks had a formative influence on the public art collections that were then being established in the UK, such as the National Gallery, National Portrait Gallery and the Victoria and Albert Museum.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The first issue was where to hold it. The steering committee commissioned an expert to scientifically calculate where it should be. “Upwind” was his considered response. Consequently a site was chosen to the south west of the city at Old Trafford. The cricket club was persuaded to move out and the Arts Treasures Exhibition was to be built alongside the Botanical Gardens, on the site vacated by MCC, later to become a dog track and now White City Shopping Centre. A competition was held to choose the design , which was won by an Edinburgh engineering firm.

A  major plank was the idea of educating the masses. Also it was to be a celebration of the Arts, Ancient and Modern, and not “trade pursuits”.

And so to Nathaniel Hawthorne. In 1853 he had been appointed US Consul to Liverpool and in July 1857 he was nearing the end of his term of office. (If you want to know more about Hawthorne's time in Britain visit this blog). He had moved his family from Southport to Old Trafford to be near the exhibition and Mrs Hawthorne has already visited. They have been in Old Trafford three days and on the 22nd Nathaniel and son, Julian, walked past the Exhibition Hall. He finally worked up the courage to visit on 24th July and he wrote:

I was unquiet, from a hopelessness of being able to enjoy it fully. Nothing is more depressing to me than the sight of a great many pictures together; . . .  Galleries of pictures are surely the greatest absurdities that ever were contrived. 

He also says he does not have a great deal to say, before giving his opinions at length. In the end he describes it as an agreeable day. This is why we love Nathaniel. Opinionated, bitter, but fair.