Coronation of King George V and Queen Mary in Westminster Abbey 1911

Curator: Good morning. We are looking at "Coronation of King George V and Queen Mary in Westminster Abbey," a print made by Joseph Pennell in 1911. Editor: What a scene! It’s quite dramatic, all those vertical lines shooting upwards, like it's trying to capture the sheer scale of the building and the event itself. The light is fantastic, highlighting the architecture but leaving all those people as just a dark mass. Curator: Pennell had a long and very public career and was known for his cityscapes, particularly during the World War I era. Here he’s capturing a moment of imperial consolidation and continuity, right before that cataclysm. You see all those spectators, representing the hierarchy of British society coming together at a pivotal historical juncture. Editor: Hierarchy indeed. Look at how that crowd is presented. So many individuals, but rendered with such quick, economical strokes that they become almost a decorative pattern filling up the space. It speaks to their labor in propping up the pomp and circumstance on display. One can only guess about the lives of all the artists that it took to produce this artwork at scale! Curator: Absolutely, it emphasizes how the monarchy depends on the spectacle of tradition. Consider the printmaking process, where identical images could be mass-produced, further disseminating the idea of imperial authority and the strength of tradition across the nation. Editor: It’s striking how he’s using such a reproducible medium to portray such an exclusive event. There's a tension there. He makes what happened on that single day available to so many people outside Westminster Abbey itself, making a luxury experience and all of the craftsmanship behind it accessible, visually anyway, to a new market of consumers. Curator: This engraving becomes more than a historical document. It actively participates in shaping the narrative of the coronation and, therefore, reinforcing the Crown's legitimacy within society and across the Empire. It brings the symbolism to the common person in a way previously unimaginable. Editor: Well, it leaves me thinking about the materials it took to disseminate images like these – the paper, the ink, the manpower, and what kind of global networks of production had to exist at the time. What was left out in order to construct this visual presentation of British society? Curator: Indeed, a perfect encapsulation of the social and material conditions of the early 20th century, skillfully interwoven into a depiction of national identity.