Study Room resource: The Great Exhibition

Sir Joseph Paxton, Facsimile of the First Sketch for the Great Exhibition Building

Sir Joseph Paxton (1801-65)
Facsimile of the First Sketch for the Great Exhibition Building
About 1850
Pen and ink on blotting paper
Museum no. E.941-1983

The Crystal Palace was an impressive building: it had three storeys with a skeleton of cast-iron columns, the glass transept rose to a height of 33 meters, the length of the building was 562 meters and the width 124 meters.

This print can be found in Print Room Box 4.

William Simpson, Souvenir of the Great Exhibition

William Simpson (1823-99)
Souvenir of the Great Exhibition, The Foreign Department
Viewed towards the Transept
1851
Colour lithograph
Museum no. 19625

The amount of glass required - 81.000 square meters - was so vast that the manufacturers, Chance Brothers of Birmingham, had to hire more glassblowers from France and Belgium. The building was, in a way, an exhibit too: a product of the new machine age.

This print can be found in Print Room Box 4.

William Simpson, Souvenir of the Great Exhibition

William Simpson (1823-99)
Souvenir of the Great Exhibition, The Transept from the Grand Entrance
1851
Colour lithograph
Museum no. 19627

The exhibition needed national support to succeed. Committees were formed all around Britain to encourage exhibitors to participate and promote the exhibition. Local committees had varying degrees of success; nevertheless, half the funding came from outside London.
     
The regions and the capital had a fruitful dialogue, and the contributions of the regional committees were an important element in the outcome of the exhibition. The Great Exhibition was thus organised 'in two directions: from the top down, and from the bottom up'. Jeffrey A. Auerbach, 'The Great Exhibition of 1851 - A Nation on Display' p. 88

This print can be found in Print Room Box 4.

George Cruikshank, The Opening of the Great Industrial Exhibition of all Nations

George Cruikshank (1792-1878)
The Opening of the Great Industrial Exhibition of all Nations
1851
Hand coloured etching
Museum no. 19648

Prince Albert officially announced the Great Exhibition in 1849, and appointed a Royal Commission to decide on the content, the building and its site, and the prizes to be given to the best exhibits. The Exhibition was conceived to demonstrate Britain's status as an industrial power, and to give a boost to manufacturing after the weak economy of the 1840s. Queen Victoria opened The Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations on May Day 1851.

This print can be found in Print Room Box 4.

H. Sharles, Royal Procession with Queen Victoria at the Great Exhibition

H. Sharles
Royal Procession with Queen Victoria at the Great Exhibition
1851
Lithograph
Museum no. 19656

This print can be found in Print Room Box 4.

T. Picken, View of the South Side

T. Picken
View of the South Side, from near the Princes Gate, Looking West
1851
Colour lithograph
Museum no. 19633

The Crystal Palace was purpose-built in Hyde Park in London to house the products of manufacturers, designers and craftsmen from Britain, its colonies and all around the world. 100,000 exhibits were on display; more than six million visitors going through the pavilions in the five months the Exhibition was open.

This print can be found in Print Room Box 4.

Philip Brannan, R. Carrick

Philip Brannan, R. Carrick
View from Kensington Gardens, Looking down the Kings Road
1851
Colour lithograph
Museum no. 19632

This print can be found in Print Room Box 4.

J. McNeven, View of the Nave - Great Exhibition 1851

J. McNeven
View of the Nave - Great Exhibition 1851
1851
Colour lithograph
Published by Ackermann
From the American Gallery
Museum no. 19643

The exhibits ranged from heavy machinery and raw materials to handmade and manufactured goods and fine art. The complicated classification system divided all the displays into four categories: Raw Materials, Machinery, Manufactures and Fine Art.
      
Food produce and lumps of coal coexisted with steam engines and steel hammers, pianos, jewellery, clothes, sculpture, timber, ivory and so on. The means of production (machinery, materials) were shown alongside the products of that process, which ranged from household goods to purely decorative objects.

This print can be found in Print Room Box 4a.

Anonymous, View of the Interior of the Great Exhibition

Anonymous
View of the Interior of the Great Exhibition
About 1851
Colour lithograph
Museum no. 19538.2

The exhibition organisers wanted to bring together all sections of Victorian society. The local committees collaborated with manual workers, but mainly the most 'respectable' of them, the artisans rather than the poorest workers. The idea of equality was not reflected in the practical arrangements, such as ticket pricing.

For the first three weeks of the exhibition, the ticket price was set at five shillings or above, which large sections of society could not afford. On the 26th of May, the ticket price was dropped to one shilling, and the lower classes were able to visit in their thousands. The mid-19th century was a time of class anxiety for the middle and upper classes, who feared that the working class would rise up to a revolution. The view among the middle and upper classes was that the working class needed to be controlled, and their entry to the exhibition would lead to chaos and mayhem. This fear was proved to be unfounded, and the exhibition passed without trouble.

This print can be found in Print Room Box 4a.

Philip Henry Delamotte, Photograph of the Interior of Crystal Palace at Sydenham.Museum no. 39:289

Philip Henry Delamotte (1821-1889)
Photograph of the Interior of Crystal Palace at Sydenham
Museum no. 39:289

The Great Exhibition closed on 11 October 1851. The Crystal Palace was rebuilt in Sydenham, on the outskirts of London, in 1854, and housed events such as the Colonial and Indian Exhibition of 1905, music festivals and moving pictures demonstrations. A fire dramatically destroyed the building and its contents in 1936, twisting the iron frames and melting the glass; the loss of Crystal Palace was seen, on the eve of the Second World War, as the end of an era.

The efforts of the Royal Commission and Prince Albert meant that South Kensington became the centre for science and art, with the South Kensington Museum (now the Victoria and Albert Museum), the Science Museum, the Natural History Museum, the Imperial College of Science and Technology and the Royal Albert Hall all located there.

This print can be found in Print Room Box 4a.

Sheffield Hardware at the Great Exhibition, 1851. Museum no. 19537.6

Sheffield Hardware at the Great Exhibition
Published Dickinson Bros.
1851
Colour lithograph
Museum no.19537.6

The main emphasis of the exhibition was on the industrial aspects of British design, and the fine arts were included to inspire designers and to improve their taste. The often highly decorated, mostly mass-produced household goods came under some criticism for being unoriginal and too elaborate in their ornamentation.
 
As Britain's industrialisation gathered pace, the mass-produced was taking over from the hand-crafted. This was reflected in the debates about the aesthetics of the exhibition, which was underlined by the Victorian discourse about the nature of factory production. The perceived lack of quality of mass-produced goods was linked to a nostalgic view of the past and of craftsmen and their expertise. This longing for the production methods of the pre-industrial age underpinned the Arts and Crafts movement and the work of William Morris. 

This print can be found in Print Room Box 4a.

Joseph Nash, The Indian Court at the Great Exhibiton

Joseph Nash (1809-78)
The Indian Court at the Great Exhibiton
1851
Colour lithograph
Museum no. 19536.11

Apart from supporting British industry, the exhibition sought to fulfil a variety of goals. The exhibition brought together the skills of individual artisans and large manufacturers; this again reflected the dialogue between the small and local (artisan) and the large and established (manufacturers).

It provided a platform for international dialogue, to benefit trade and exchange of skills, but also for the improvement of international understanding. The possible economic interests and gains were balanced by social and cultural agenda. All the aims were underlined by a wish to educate all participants: the exhibitors about new methods of production, visitors about new products, as well as the British about taste. 

This print can be found in Print Room Box 4a.