Toegangsportaal van het Stadhuis van Manchester 1877

Curator: This is a photograph by J. McLeod dating from 1877, depicting the entrance portal of Manchester's Town Hall. It’s preserved as a print within a bound volume. Editor: It feels so monumental. The muted sepia tones lend a kind of gravitas, almost imposing the Victorian-era ideal of civic responsibility. Curator: Right. I’m interested in what this image tells us about Manchester as an emerging industrial power and how the Town Hall became a symbol of that power and municipal authority through impressive architectural craftsmanship. What labor and resources went into such an elaborate civic structure and its representation? Editor: And how was this structure meant to operate politically? Considering who this was meant to include. Also, photographs such as this also functioned as propaganda, framing power within the context of public space and cementing hierarchies. Did the photographer work for the city, or for themself? Were they using the then-modern form of media and image circulation to critique this use of resources or elevate it? Curator: Excellent questions! Consider that photography at this time was quite a labor-intensive process, involving specialized knowledge and equipment. Who had access to these technologies, and how did that shape the image's narrative? What sort of specialized glass and paper were used to take this photograph, and who in turn produced it? Editor: Also, think of what civic buildings stood for during the time. To me, seeing images such as these and acknowledging the various decisions that must've taken place in designing them and choosing who was working for them, and the type of visual material to put out helps understand power on display at the time. Curator: And thinking of McLeod, perhaps even consider themself an artist-engineer with a specific aim. And certainly, there’s a tension in presenting a document of such an imposing edifice through photography, in essence attempting to contain its scale, even reproduce its symbolic significance via circulation of image media. Editor: Exactly. Analyzing the materiality of its reproduction then gives us an exciting picture of Victorian ambitions. Curator: A great image, speaking volumes. Editor: Indeed; many layers of time to consider.