Twee vissers met hun visgerei before 1901

This photograph of two fishermen with their gear was made by Frank Meadow Sutcliffe. His photography presents an idealised vision of working-class life in late 19th-century Britain. Sutcliffe lived and worked in Whitby, a coastal town in North Yorkshire, England. He was keen to depict the picturesque qualities of local life for the tourist market, although his images also had success in the art world. Like many photographers, he was interested in capturing the everyday activities of ordinary people. But photographs such as this also reflect the social structure of Victorian England. Sutcliffe's composition romanticizes the labor of fishing as well as the simplicity of rural existence. The viewer is invited to see a timeless, untroubled scene, even as industrialization brought widespread changes. To understand Sutcliffe’s project fully, it would be useful to examine local archives and publications to consider the real social conditions and what role photographs played in shaping the public image of the town.