Limehouse 1906

Curator: "Limehouse," etched in 1906 by Joseph Pennell. You know, at first glance, it looks a bit like a misty dream. Editor: Yes, a dream with teeth. Those buildings, piled high, are reflected so deeply into the water, it feels less like serenity and more like a submerged intensity. All that brown. It makes me wonder about industry and the passage of time. Curator: That somberness certainly resonates, given Limehouse's history as a working-class district in London's East End. Pennell captures a moment thick with the city's breath. The buildings almost appear to breathe, don't they? As if exhaling secrets into the Thames. Editor: Absolutely, look how the artist uses water to invert not just buildings, but really the order of the city. Everything is heavy on top, mirrored underneath – so that it's all uncertain, and makes one ask what is solid, what can be relied upon? What is the shadow, and what is real? Curator: The way he uses the etching medium to render this densely packed urban landscape is fascinating. See how the fine lines create a sense of atmosphere and detail. There are actually figures, boats, all swallowed by a unifying melancholy, yet brought into focus by a lone church spire— an act of defiance against the industrial mood? Editor: Defiance perhaps or more of an acknowledgement? Church steeples were some of the only architecture visible beyond factory smog! I would say here is Pennell documenting both the physical skyline, the spire of London as an iconic marker and simultaneously the "spiritual" cost of industry on the city’s collective soul, you feel a premonition of change in the air don't you? Curator: Indeed. There's a kind of ghostly beauty here. Editor: Pennell forces us to acknowledge London as a layered symbol; its past and present are interwoven, full of yearning for something solid yet aware of inevitable change. Curator: Well, I'll be contemplating Limehouse's dual identity now for weeks, probably. Editor: Me too! This makes one pause and wonder; that's what all good images should do.