Dr Tristram Hunt, Director, Victoria and Albert Museum
Our Great National Temple of Art and Industry
On the 23rd of November 2023, Dr Tristram Hunt delivered a plenary lecture at the National Gallery of Ireland on “Great Exhibitions and Great Museums in London and Dublin”, ahead of the conference celebrating the 170th anniversary of the Great Industrial Exhibition of Dublin the following day.
Dr Tristram Hunt is Director of the V&A – the world’s leading museum of art, design and performance. Since taking up the post in 2017, he has championed design education in UK schools, encouraged debate around the history of the museum’s global collections and overseen the transition to a multi-site museum, with the opening of V&A Dundee, the creation of Young V&A (formerly V&A Museum of Childhood), and the development of V&A East – a new museum and open access collections centre in Stratford, East London.
Well Caroline thank you very very much uh indeed it’s a great privilege uh to be here um this evening uh Caroline we miss you uh in London uh but um you’re achieving so much uh At This brilliant um institution and it was wonderful to
Have uh a cup of tea earlier um at the uh Royal Irish Academy and to note in that way that people from Stoke on Trent do as I turned over the cup and saucer that they were made in the Ries uh by a very great company uh called steelite so
Uh Waterford and Wedgwood had their troubles but there are others available um I want to also uh thank the world Dublin society and the National Gallery and the national museum of Island for contributing to uh this evening’s lecture and of course the conference which opens uh tomorrow um as we know uh
This year marks the7th anniversary of the 1850 3 great industrial exhibition held here in Dublin an immensely important milestone in Irish Cultural history it has had far-reaching cultural consequences not least in the legacy of this great institution and in the foundation of its incredible collection of art from the
Likes uh of Jack b8es John lavy Daniel MCC and Francis dambi to of course the great collections uh upstairs the tishan the Goya the REM the caravas this is a collection with a widespread contemporary influence and also a relevance for the Victoria and Albert uh Museum because it was on
Viewing V’s Exquisite woman writing a letter with her maid which you can see here for free without standing behind 10 people uh at the recent verir uh exhibition that the great Architects the Dublin cork London based Architects so Donald and Tumi became fascinated by the folds of the dress sleeves and those
Spaces created between body and fabric and that was part of the inspiration that odonnell and Tumi took uh for their design for our new VNA East uh Museum on the East Bank uh in the uh Olympic Park and actually when you put them together
Uh you can see it so so very clearly um perhaps also why I’ve been kindly invited here this evening is the Victoria and Albert Museum too emerg from the legacy of a great International exhibition staged in London just two years before the Dublin successor this first World Expo the great exhibition of
The industry of all nations in 1851 was the largest exhibition ever held in a daring Venture of Epic scale 34 Nations and their Empires displayed more than 100,000 designed products from from almost 14,000 exhibitors inside a vast glass building covering almost 19 Acres each country competed to demonstrate its prowess in design and
Manufacture yet with Britain and its Empire dominating the displays it is so often credited as being a pivotal point in mid 19th century industrialization that moment uh of British Imperial huis and Israelis great phrase Britain as the workshop of the world presenting a view of the world as seen from a primarily
British perspective from this ambitious start the grand concept of a great International exhibition was born quickly inspiring other nations to initiate their own versions of its pioneering success and today the World Expo tradition continues and each Global Gathering of Nations the last uh in Dubai in 2021 the next in Japan in 2025
Welcomes tens of millions of visitors allowing countries to build extraordinary Pavilions and transform host cities they hope for years to come these spectacular gestures hold Universal attention and alongside the modern Olympics have accumulated the largest Gatherings of people of all time in fact The Scholar Paul greenhalf estimates conservatively that between
1851 and 2005 well over 1 billion people visited a World Expo so from London to Dublin Dubai to Osaka how did this mega event for National expression Global Connection and spectacular scale take root and how should we interrogate its continued relevance today in our own era of decarbonization and questions around
Decolonization so let’s start at the beginning with the tenacious civil servant and the first director of the Victorian Albert Museum Sir Henry Cole looking like a director of the Victorian Albert Museum should look um he can take much credit for the birth of the Expo for Cole uh the so-called founding
Father of British International exhibitions had visited national displays such as the 1849 Exposition National in Paris and had returned to England with a determination to create a truly International adaptation in London like many other theories it came from France Cole recorded in his autobiography the early Endeavors of the
British Society of Art and then the Mechanics Institute movement had already generated large public exhibitions of Art and Industry alongside similar European examples particularly in France that set an emphasis on technological advancement yet they remain distinctly National in scope the difference came with Prince Albert with global competition growing
There came an increasing recognition in the potential for Market expansion abroad so when the idea of a great exhibition first originated the ambitious Henry Cole put it to Prince Albert as president of the Royal Society of Arts that the plan spectacle could deviate from that National ideal and embrace foreign Productions in order
Partly to Showcase British industrial lead but also crucially this idea that Albert had that Britain was falling behind Albert was a modernizer and a reformer uh and just as he uh modernized the British army uh the Oxford universities sought to do so at the Royal Family he had this very strong
Sense that the British manufacturing capacity was falling behind um its European and Global competitors that by the 1840s and 50s Britain uh which had led the Industrial Revolution uh in the 1770s and 1780s was beginning to rest on its Laurels and so a grand exhibition an international
Exhibition would not only be this sort of display of patriotic pride and fervor it would also uh be this kind of uh Zeal uh to transform and update manufacturing uh and design in the UK and Albert had this idea of using the exhibition in this much more reformist mode than
Sometimes uh we think this fear over the poor quality of British manufacturer specifically design and workmanship was part of the original inspiration for the great uh exhibition so the decision was made to invite the most industrially advanced nations of the world to take part in the quotes friendly competition and peaceful
Goodwill of a decidedly International exhibition with the idea of britishness expressed to other nations through the might of industry and Empire and behind it also this kind of cite idea uh of the beneficial peaceful merits of global free trade as The Illustrated magazine of art would declare in 1853 400 years
Ago the public will and spirit was expressed in tournaments and Crusades today the same chivalric sentiment shows itself in exhibitions of international industry this wasn’t quite right because only a decade earlier the Eglington tournament uh had taken place uh which was a lavish medieval display of fox
Chivalry uh overseen by Lord enton at his AA estate drawing tens of thousands for a sharc reenactment um and this was always one of you know the great tensions of Victorian society on this one hand this great historicism and yearning for continuity in the past and on the other this thirst for modernity
Uh and Innovation and you see that even within the Pavilions of the great exhibition where one of the most most popular is the medieval Court of pugin so marrying this historicism and modernity was always a tension uh within Victorian Civic culture the great exhibition was not without public remonstration despite the
Enthusiastic support of Prince Albert as president of the royal commission established to oversee the great exhibition Enterprise here having serious meeting there was vifer opposition in some political quarters mainly arising from the suspected cost to the taxpayer the times in particular wrote to the potential damage to hid
Park and as ever with the times the threat to property values but often criticism was leveled at the Busy Body energetic modernizing Prince Albert himself who has mistrusted for his overtly quote German Notions Colonel sibthorp um the Member of Parliament uh for Lincoln shown here in this punch
Caricature was extreme in his critique calling the exhibition quotes one of the greatest humbugs one of the greatest frauds one of the greatest absurdities ever known regardless Prince Albert pushed ahead and actually that sort of sneering critique from the aristocratic landed Anglican classes only fired Albert up Moore in order to achieve uh
Its completion Henry Cole doggedly pursued uh widespread private sponsorship amongst thousands of contributors the government spearheaded by liberal prime minister Lord John Russell though largely approving contributed virtually nothing financially and Caroline and I are well-versed with government’s RCS to get support from across the country while contributing nothing financially
Over 300 local committees were formed around the UK to gather the funds and organize local exhibitors outside London the greatest support arose from the industrial centers of Glasgow Leeds Manchester and Bradford an architectural competition was initiated to create a building to house it all above all the great exhibition was as Anthony Hamber
Has recorded a phenomenal instance of administration and human effort the sheer scale of the great exhibition was perhaps its most impressive asset a single vast building enclosing 33 million cubic feet was erected Ed in London’s hide Park to accommodate 10 miles of displays this so-called Crystal Palace said to have
Been christened uh by punch magazine was of course designed by the chief Gardener at Chatsworth house sir Joseph Paxton um and uh has been described as one of the most influential buildings uh ever erected Paxton’s winning design and this is the original sketch was adapted from a pioneering glass Conservatory he had
Produced for the Duke of devonshire’s Chatsworth estate in darbishire it salvaged an unsuccessful public competition with costs arriving at 28% of the nearest rival it utilized prefabricated mass-produced components of glass and iron constructed in an ingenious modular design and took just n months to build um and when we ever when
We ever had have those moments of sort of you know 10 months of planning permissions and hs2 and sort of everything we always look back to the building I think of the Crystal Palace uh in Hyde Parker that mid Victorian Mo notion of can do achievement this technologically advanced structure
Became an awesome indication of the capabilities of industry and in many ways became the symbol uh of the age for this innovative structure enclosed a space so vast that several of the world’s largest existing buildings could fit inside side by side yet it had to cost proportionately less than the
Cheapest building imaginable it needed to be erected in months not years and easily dismantled crucially at the exhibition’s conclusion planning disputes led by the Ferocious Colonel sibthorp even forced the building uh to enclose a series of mature Elm trees uh without causing harm and the dispute
Over the trees was another way to bash uh Prince uh Albert as well as the tenacious sidor there were also critics um on the cultural left the influential writer and art critic John Ruskin whose work the stones of Venice would be issued at the uh same time was as you might expect
Skeptical of the capitalist ethos which underpinned its creation he protested in that very ruskinian way against the notion that the construction of a greenhouse larger than ever Greenhouse was built before had any artistic significance it was ruskin’s belief that quotes mechanical Ingenuity is not the essence either of painting or
Architecture and largess of Dimension does not necessarily involve nobleness of design just as Ruskin is celebrating the does Palace as the central building of the world the kind of horror of the Crystal Palace uh is there presented before him what was more the Great Horror for Ruskin was that the self-
Congratulation of the exhibition took place while some of the greatest art of European civilization most notably the cycle of tintoretto paintings uh in venice’s school of San Rocco was at risk of Destruction uh from war and neglect and the shelling of the Austrian Army when all that glittering roof was built
In order to exhibit the poultry art of our fashionable luxury the carved bedsteads of Vienna and glued toys of Switzerland and gay jewelry of France that very year I say the greatest pictures of the Venetian Masters were rotting at Venice in the rain for want
Of roof to cover them with holes made by Cannon shot on their canvas Ralph Nicholson waren a future keeper of London’s National Gallery was similar dismissive of the whole Enterprise quotes the Paramount impression conveyed to the critical mind must be a general want of Education in taste William Morris and his family also
Visited the famed exhibition and though yet not a designer nor a Craftsman uh the the precious 17-year-old William Morris refused to go inside he he condemned the quotes wonderfully ugly British objects on display and rejected the modern building encasing them the exhibition would come to embody the sort of exploitative
Victorian materialism that Morris fought against throughout his lifetime yet for millions of visitors the Crystal Palace out sha every object brought to reside under its transparent skin inside Paxton’s IR columns were decorated in bold primary colors Vivid Reds yellows and Blues this simple paint Scheme introduced to
The wider public the color theories of Owen Jones one of the most prolific designers and important in 19th century Britain his colorful geometric pattern designs looked to Islamic and Indian traditions for inspiration it was his strongly held belief that nonwestern ornament offered a far superior model for European design to emulate and his
Drawings of the alhamra palace are shown here on the right and again this is one of the interesting sort of tensions it seems to me uh of the great exhibition on the one hand um this announcement of European uh and Colonial industrial might and pride on the other hand what
Emerges from the great exhibition is this realization of the profound beauty of South Asian and Persian Art and Design which is going to influence uh so much design thinking uh in Britain led by Owen Jones and William Morris um in the later 19th century as the exhibition’s superintendent of Works
Jones applied his scientific approach to ornament and color in carefully prescribed proportions to create depth and perspective inside the Crystal Palace his was also the overall scheme for the entire arrangement of displays but his colorful designs proved radical to a Victorian public and these generated much criticism Jones was
Undeterred and his confidence was ultimately Vindicated when all criticism dispersed at the exhibition’s opening one visitor even claimed that the building was not decorated with color but built up of it by now a household name Jones spurred on by what he saw in the great exhibition Crystal Palace committed to reform contemporary design
Through Arts education not just for designers but also for the general public The Eclectic mix of exhibits was extraordinary and wholly undiscriminating from raw material atal to precious metal work sculpture to stained glass windows printing presses to steam locomotives Furniture to domestic conveniences microscopes to an early submarine a traveling piano to a
Prototype fax machine this Collision of consumerism industry and spectacle was led by the United Kingdom and its Empire which claimed half the floor area the other half was divided between participating countries uh and uh their colonies display introduced Britain to an often otherwise remote idea of Empire as Jeffrey albach has explained this
System quotes enabled Britains to locate themselves in the context of their empire and of the broader world even as it also attempted to incorporate much of the rest of the world into a British centered economic orbit it was I think a really important moment uh in giving a global sensibility and an imperial
Sensibility to so many of the visitors but albat continues if Britain used the exhibition to represent the world so too did its colonies and other countries use the exhibition to represent themselves the largest number of foreign exhibits came from Britain’s close Ally and rival France and also the United
States the Greek slave by American sculptor here and Powers attracted enormous publicity even becoming one of the most popular and replicated works of the 19th century people sit before it as wrapped and almost as silent as devotees at a religious ceremony wrote the New York Daily Tribune it gained a claim as
One of the wied Mard exhibits in the classical style of ancient Greece but it was not produced by Greece nor located in the small Greek display of natural produce and folkcrafts that aimed to portray Greece as a modern European State newly independent from the Ottoman Empire the dominant image of Greece was
Instead found within the American Court while the Greek display was located next to Turkey its former colonizer the sculpture’s notoriety was enhanced further by its relationship to the American slavery debate we have the Greek captive in dead Stone published punch magazine why not the Virginia Slave in living ebony as Peter
Hoffenberg has pointed out Nations and races resemblance and differences were invented coordinated and legitimized through the exhibition’s carefully choreographed World viw comparatively the exhibition’s Irish contributions were few in number yet despite the exhibition’s proximity to the very worst years of the Great Famine the Committees of the leading cities
Dublin cork Belfast had still successfully persuaded nearly 300 individuals and firms to send contributions members of the royal Dublin Society were very likely involved in the organization of these exhibits while there were Irish exhibits there was no independent Irish display contributions were included within the overarching British section indicative
Of that remaining ambiguity over Ireland’s relationship with the United Kingdom the most significant Irish exhibits were in the fields of flax linen lace muslin and poplin and one of the most notable was the linen display of the belfast-based Royal Society for improving and promoting the growth of flax in Ireland a collection could
Considered so valuable that it was awarded a much coveted Council medal drawing the exhibition opening Queen Victoria was even said to be dressed in a robe of Irish Poppin as the official catalog stated the exhibition is open to tell its own tale and is now submitted to the
Judgment of the world and here this wonderful of all the world coming to see the great um exhibition capitalizing on the recent connectivity of the Railway across the country more than 6 million visits were paid to the Crystal Palace equivalent of one fifth of the British population when accounting for foreign
And repeat visits more than a 100,000 people visited every day at its height it was as many have determined since also the first serious influx to London on a mass scale by International tourists captured here such was the exhibition’s success that it confounded all predictions and generated a vast profit of £86,000
Equivalent to tens of millions today and you get those wonderful accounts amongst my favorite is um Titus salt taking all his workers uh from Su uh from Bradford uh on the on a specially commissioned train down to the great exhibition for the day so that the workers could see
What was being made around the world and across Britain uh and then all having this fantastic lunch uh and then being taken back up uh on the trains uh uh to Yorkshire um unsurprisingly uh others uh were Keen to replicate this immense publicity tourism and financial success
That could Advance what was regarded as a new era of industrial progress soon Ireland’s First National industrial exhibition held in in 1852 was among those hoping to generate significant economic waves of its own this was of course particularly significant for a post famine economy in a year when immigration was at its peak
Comparatively Cork’s exhibition was small about 140,000 visitors but it was successful enough to cover its costs and to provide commercial benefit for its contributors star exhibits even included works such as cork native Daniel E’s study for the spirit of Justice one report in the times described the city
On the eve of its opening as like a beehive full of life expectation energy bustle business human industry is awake and active there’s not a Tradesman in the city of cork unemployed Cork’s experiment was of course a precursor to a much greater spectacle one year later William dargon
The leading Irish engineer and wh Railway entrepreneur believed a larger Irish exhibition this time International in scope could be even more beneficial daram proposed to underwrite the cost of transforming the next in the trianal series of exhibitions staged by the Royal Dublin Society with dargan’s patronage the 1853
RDS exhibition was to be an Irish great industrial exhibition the first International exhibition to be held after 1851 and the true successor uh to Paxton’s Crystal Palace as in London there was no government assistance so thanks to dargan’s huge investment of nearly 100,000 and no public subscription the Irish great industrial exhibition opened
On lster lawn on the 12th May 1853 a great hope and promise for the future of Ireland wrote One contemporary account and so valued was dargon’s altruistic role that his towering statue was erected inside the building in tribute to his great and inestable qualities not only as a public employer
But as the benefactor of his country uh as the pedestal inscription read of course another statue honoring dargon unveiled at the gallery’s opening in 1864 still stands guard outside the gallery’s entrance Dublin’s own Temple of industry was modeled on Paxton’s design and also featured a colossal iron and glass uh
Pavilion yet in this adapted construction by the Irish architect Sir John Benson kned for his contribution the most prominent material was wood three primary exhibition areas were constructed covering an area of around six acres approximately onethird of the area of the great exhibition enclosed by great domed partially glazed
Roofs the scale of the central Hall the organizers were Keen to point out was greater than those of the main hall at the Crystal Palace and while the interior was decorated uh in much the same style as Owen Jones’s scheme in London additional features were added to bring about an originality of concept
That distinguished it from its predecessor just as in 1851 it was deemed that the building itself was perhaps the most successful novelty exhibited both in art and manufacture naturally Irish art manufacturing industry dominated over 1,460 exhibitors from the United Kingdom and some 400 from other parts of the world most notably France Belgium
Holland uh and the German Zine Coalition um of States all exhibits were arranged according to the 1851 classifications however one distinct difference emerged in London the Fine Arts had only been included to demonstrate an element of scientific technological or industrial advance that very strong idea that this exhibition was there to
Promote technology and design and Manufacturing rather than simply the enjoyment of fine or decorative art there were no official areas in London devoted to painting few architectural exhibits while sculpture was used primarily as a decorative device to frame Vistas Dublin recognized this shortfall and attempted to correct the imbalance declaring that while the
Industrial or utilitarian Arts still dominated as in London the Fine Arts have been admitted to a place in the exposition and that to an extent not here to for conceded to them so Dublin became the first world exhibition to include paintings within this expanded Fine Arts Court over 300 prominent Irish
Artists were displayed Francis d is the delu William mared’s the wolf and the lamb Joseph haves blind Piper um otherwise celebrated works exhibited from the likes of Reynolds uh rembrand and Rubin the first sensation experienced by the visitor upon entering the Great Hall of the industrial exhibition is that of Wonder and
Admiration wrote the 1853 edition of the exhibition Expositor and Advertiser for the moment everything crowds alike upon the eye and upon the mind one of the most spectacular and popular displays was the so-called Eastern collection comprising mainly Indian and Chinese articles from clothes textiles precious stones and metals to pieces of armor and
Weapons and in fact this was the same collection of East India Company exhibits with some supplementary works as was previously displayed at the great exhibition it proved to be the largest event of its kind ever held in Ireland attracting over 1 million visitors including uh Victoria who visited uh
With Prince Albert on the 29th of August she had already sent a large collection of loaned objects to the exhibition and she later expressed her admiration for the building and its displays a grand equestrian statue of Queen Victoria by Carlo marochetti another medieval throwback in the cultural motif of
Eglington stood prominent ly at the building’s Center the statue was later relocated to its permanent home uh in glasgow’s George square and it’s not the one that always has uh the car parking uh cone on top of its head um the main exhibition catalog stated boldly we do
Not doubt that his Royal Highness Prince Albert on visiting the Irish Capital will earnestly Rejoice that his indefatigable exertions and enlightened policy which made 15 which made that year 1851 memorable have again borne rich fruitage and again Advanced the best interests of his country the sense of Dublin’s success
Was replicated in The Wider press a new Crystal Palace wrote The Illustrated London news has been designed built opened and filled with a rich and varied display of objects of Art and Industry such as were never gathered together in any part of the world except at the first Crystal Palace in Hyde
Park while Rich and varied in many respects London and to a lesser extent Dublin had Incorporated the Fine Arts only as a postcript uh to objects of Industry Five Years on Manchester in a sense took on the mantle uh from um Dublin and sought to rectify this emission despite in fact because of
Manchester’s industrial dominance cottonopolis the city’s 1857 art Treasures exhibition was to promote Fine Art above all else it became the largest of its kind Europe had ever witnessed with Michelangelo and Raphael competing with Van djk constables and tians um and in a sense that was the purpose famously I think it
Was the Duke of Manchester the Duke Jeffer um when he was asked to lend to the exhibition he wrote back you know what in the world do you want with art why can’t you stick to your cotton spinning um and indeed that was the very point that Manchester was seeking to
Rebrand its identity uh through its own art Treasures um exhibition um to move away uh from that kind of deenan idea of what the the city stood for today the Victorian Albert Museum owes a great deal to the Mater serial Legacy uh of both 1851 and 1853 besides Crystal Palace memorabilia
Commemorative toyss teaspoons paper weights mugs plates there also exists a Bedrock collection of 244 objects purchased from the great exhibition that formed the core of a new of a new Museum of manufacturer which was the first name uh for uh the VNA this was at the time facilit ated by a generous government
Grant of £5,000 today about £5,000 then about £700,000 today secured by the ever determined coal to make sure that there was a legacy of the artifacts from the great uh exhibition interestingly the amount spent on Indian Acquisitions and South Asia AC Acquisitions was twice that of British objects and more than
34s of that given for Continental uh items and unsurprisingly Owen Joe was strongly making the case that the material coming from south Asia and from the Middle East needed to be acquired for a new Museum uh collection many great exhibition Works made in Dublin were part of this purchase this a card
Table part of a large suite of bogu furniture made by Arthur J Jones and sun while three textile designs exhibited by Dublin firms R Atkinson and Co and WM Goen are among samples of textiles made for display uh in 1851 R Atkinson and CO’s briaded Poppin
Uh design in the top right w a prize medal while the firm even had a jackard loom in action among the displays meanwhile many VNA collection objects were also brought directly from Dublin’s great exhibition these bres were made uh by G gns Waterhouse uh of Dublin who specialized in adapting um
Antiquarian Celtic jewelry Queen Victoria too bought similar items as souvenirs Waterhouse was the first commercial owner of the celebrated 8th Century Tara Broach that of course now resides in the national museum of Ireland and as will be well known to you the Tara BR and the other enormously
Significant objects such as the 12th century Cross of Kong originated from the Royal Irish Academy Museum and they were loaned to the great industrial exhibition James holds worth and Co manufactured the Machinery that produced this wonderful uh embroidery and displayed this piece in 1853 to promote the sale of their machines the trimming
Was purchased to Showcase this industrial process that would take a skilled embroiderer weeks to produce by hands and while not purchased directly from Dublin this wood carving um by prominent figure William Gibbs Roger was originally exhibited alongside a large group in Dublin so coming out of the exhibitions uh were important part of
The collections uh for the museum the VNA owes even more to the great um exhibition because the The Profit um the success despite what Colonel C thought thought um of um the great exhibition uh allowed Prince Albert to think about a legacy and so he then decided to purchase south of
Kensington Palace in an area that would become known as South Kensington which was uh um orchards in in neighborhood was then Brompton um he begins to lay out this this cultural quarter what today we call albertopolis which houses uh the Royal College of Music the Royal Albert Hall uh uh Imperial College in
Time Science Museum Natural History Museum uh and of course originally uh the South Kensington uh Museum and here’s the vision um for uh laying it uh out the plan was to create an establishment in which by the application of science and art to Industrial Pursuits the industry of all
Nations may be raised in the scale of human employment um and in a sense this is really one of the the kind of first cultural quarters but actually uh it’s kind of modeled on on Berlin uh and and and and and um the the the early combination of universities uh and
Museums uh uh there and the South Kensington Museum was originally uh a combination of science and art what Albert wanted it to be was uh the central Storehouse or treasury of science and art for the use of the whole Kingdom um so rather than just having as
Ruskin and Morris feared this kind of ephemeral moment of the Great exhibition the South Kensington Museum would provide a longlasting legacy to inspire the designers and makers and creatives and artists of tomorrow with those collections um and to begin with of course it was this combination of science and art and then in
1899 the science museum moved over the road they left us um and the Victorian Alber Museum uh as it became uh focused much more on Art and Design and later uh uh performance so right from the beginning of the South Kensington Museum of the VNA it had this strongly almost
Dactic utilitarian focus on using these collections not just for enjoyment but to encourage artists and creatives and designers uh to be the very best uh makers and designers in the world education reform lay at the heart of Albert’s uh Vision uh as Julius Bryant uh our keeper Emeritus at the BNA writes
For these were not to be traditional museums as galleries for connoisseurs and archives antiquarians but rather places for the widest public where collections on display would prompt instruction and debate and that’s why the VNA always had this very very strong Democratic impulse behind it again they like to in the early days contrast
Themselves slightly with the British Museum and National Gallery that this was just as those millions of people people came to Crystal Palace so the South Kensington Museum was to be this open popular Democratic space so for example it had one of the first uh restaurants and cafes in a museum so
That you could have an enjoyable day out uh there was gaslighting in the galleries so that working people could visit uh after a day’s work there were labels next to the object so you didn’t have to buy uh an expensive Gallery guide all all of this with a very strong
Feel of opening up the collections and the objects the national collections uh and the objects to the people uh one of um the the the great sort of uh mentors of Prince Albert uh the the architect and and uh Democratic um radical uh gotfried Seer described museums as the
True teachers of a free people uh and this idea that joined the growth of democracy in the 19 Century the citizens of the future needed to be educated to weigh the responsibility of democracy properly and museums were part of that role and so making sure they felt as open and
Accessible and engaging as possible was an important part um of that within the grand pediment uh of the Victorian architecture what was intended to be the Museum’s Street facing main entrance the vna’s origins were commemorated a scene in Black and Gold MC reads the first exhibition of the works of Industry of
All Nation Queen Victoria you can see in the middle hands out Laurels to the world’s Prize winners uh and the shape behind her you can see is the outline of the Crystal Palace um so they’re connecting the origins of the museum absolutely uh with the great exhibition
Uh of 1851 and the names of the participating nations are then listed uh uh in uh the Border the Belfast born military engineer Captain Francis folk a man who Cole described as possessing a fertility of invention which amounted to genius how would all like that to be described
Ourselves uh had been bought on to supervise further additions uh to the expanding Museum yet before he was tasked in South Kensington FAL as a member of the science and art Department in London had been sent to Dublin to report on the planned construction of the National Gallery here he modified
The earlier design to mirror the dimensions of the nearby Natural History Museum completed in 1857 and introduced pioneering Innovations to enhance the National gallery’s Construction ventilation and lighting the Irish Times responded enthusiastically as jars Waterfield has since described the new gallery and its Central Dublin site asserted the place
Of Irish culture as part of a broader historical tradition um and it’s always always said that the the masonry um uh that um folks use that that his similarity of design between uh the Royal Albert Hall um and then what became the Henry cowing um on exhibition
Road is this kind of brick gles around the world still come and see it uh for the Excellence uh of its execution from the push for free trade in a global economy to the pursuit of self-defined national identities these great exhibitions of 1851 1853 have left legacies of astonishing multiplicity
Joseph Paxton’s revolutionary glar housee more akin to a railway station than traditional Museum sparked countless imitators and heralded a new era in engineering and architecture in their displays of commercial Domesticity from household items to pioneering conveniences the exhibitions had a transformative effect on interior decoration and patterns of consumption
Among an expanding middle class there’s also remarkable levels of social integration with all classes from royalty to agricultural workers brought together Under One Roof a newly positive definition of working people emerged forging virtuous associations uh between Labor uh and creativity while exposure to International competition kickstarted a whol scale reform of domestic design
Standards and training with the already established system of national design schools again coming out uh of uh the Victorian Albert Museum expanding and thriving so how do we apply these lessons gleaned from our from the great exhibitions to uh the running of the Victorian Albert Museum today how do we
Reflect uh upon this remarkable uh Heritage and Legacy and its meaning uh now I think the first point um Remains the most powerful that the foundation of the VNA had a vision of education at its uh core and that was a different calling uh to many other museums established um at
The same time um the Royal College of Art was part of the Victorian Albert Museum the government schools of design were part using this collection uh to inspire makers and artists and designers was Central to the mission and even today 40% uh of visitors to the Victorian Albert Museum describe
Themselves as from the creative um Industries uh and when we think of these great figures like Owen Jones and William Morris and Henry Cole within the story of the VNA it connects to that as well and to my mind that’s needed now more than ever because in Britain today
Well in England today at the very moment when digital technology and the fourth Industrial Revolution is rendering immaterial the two cultures casm of the 20th century and there’s no greater symbol of that than the science museum separating off from the Victorian Albert Museum our education system is undermining design education at a
Phenomenal rate uh we’re seeing the closure um of art colleges uh and design courses and over the past 12 years there’s been a 71% drop in the number of young people taking design and Technology as a gcsc we’re seeing this absolutely start collapse just at the moment when our economy and Society uh
Needs uh this level uh of support um you combine that with new processes around the curriculum uh which Narrows uh the levels of teaching and also per pupil funding squeeze which always hits Art and Design courses all of that uh is hurting the teaching of Art and Design
Uh within um England and so to my mind the role of the VNA is not just to Stand By and Watch that but is to do something about it so we run a number of courses um uh a number of programs called Design Lab Nation about sharing our collections
Across the country focusing on keystage three and keystage four supporting the professional development of design and Technology uh uh teachers and then also in our museums making sure we’re encouraging Innovation and creativity on the bottom right you can see a picture of the new Young VNA um which um opened
In uh July uh this year it was the old Museum of childhood many of you remember the old toy museum in in Bethel green um which was full of wonderful uh Victorian glass vrin full of action men from the 1950s uh which parents and grandparents enjoyed visiting and children were left
Bewildered and confused by um and now we’ve transformed it into a space for children uh focused on design imagination and play Zero uh to 14 uh using our collections to encourage creativity uh and to build cultural confidence uh and then in the top left you can see one of those architectural
Renders we’ve all enjoyed seeing over the years um of our new Storehouse facility um we we simply do not have this these number of pediments or neoc classical sculpture within the collection but um this is going to open up the reserve collection of the Victorian Albert Museum that question
Museum directors always get where have you hidden all the other stuff well you can now go and see it for yourself um and again this is about particularly in East London encouraging designers and makers and artists to engage with the collection it’s a kind of Reinventing that idea of a great Storehouse of
Science and art uh for uh the 21st century secondly I think you know the Wonder of London and Dublin was the sheer volume of people attending and the range of people attending um not being ashamed of being the people’s Galleries and having that Focus uh on uh on the
Public um as Jeffrey arbach has said the Crystal Palace was indeed a shopping mall and a department store they had that kind of open arcades feel uh to visiting uh the collections which we then see in the development of the of the great Department Stores of the mid
19th centuries Whit ley’s for example when it was opened in 186 3 was described as an immense Symposium of the Arts and industries of the nation uh and of the world and so that idea of welcoming the public in which is so profoundly important and Central to the
Eths of that um is the the public exhibition program and the public program um the VNA have been putting on brilliant exhibitions since 1863 uh when the first exhibition was the wedding list of The Prince and Princess of Wales so when anyone ever tells me I’m dumbing down the program I
Say no no no no the first exhibition was the wedding list of The Prince and Princess of Wales and in the bottom left you can see our sellout uh Gabrielle Chanel fashion Manifesto exhibition um at the moment but making sure we’re keeping the collections alive and the
Museum alive uh through publicly uh uh through through public programs and exhibitions I think again is a big part of the meaning uh of the museum and I think museums in in the mid 20th century uh became much more inward-looking and Scholastic um and there was one of my
Great previous directors famous he said we all breathe the S of relief when the public finally leave um whereas actually we’re now going back to that that mid Victorian idea of the people’s Galleries and being open to the public uh in an accessible uh and Democratic uh way and finally and most importantly
Creativity the Expo movement sparked in 1851 continues to flourish those themes ini iated there are still imitated across these Global Mega events today architecture of Epic scale yet temporary and design Global capital and international Brands underwriting National boosterism ambitious content and programming of remarkable scope and phenomenal appeal attracting Millions
Over many months but in our age of Net Zero Ambitions and Millennial skepticism about the European industrial Colonial past and with Riad now favorite to host World Expo 2030 can we remain confident that the Expo ideal remains relevant and purposeful today has this 19th century culture of expansionism incalculable expenditure architectural extravagance
And mass tourism reached its peak in the coming era of decarbonization and decolonization I think before we dispatch it totally to the scrap peep we should not lose sight at its core of the importance of the foregrounding in these exhibitions of the maker and the designer in 1851 it was Joseph Paxton’s
Architectural Brilliance and Owen Jones’s bold interior schemes that secured the exhibition’s Legacy at Expo 2010 on the left in Shanghai Thomas heatherwick’s wonderfully memorable seed Cathedral design drewing crowds won plaudits and prizes and an exp 2021 as it became in Dubai it was esz Devin’s towering Timber Pavilion with reeling
Computer generated poetry that captured imaginations powerful creativity and design imprint far greater influence than any Nation branding exercise at the VNA we continue to place this premium on creativity we provide we hope a place for Creative Endeavor from Baro sculpture to digital installation medieval tapestries to contemporary photography just as the visiting public
Were inspired by what they saw inside the Crystal Palace the vna’s galleries like the National Gallery of irelands exist to inspire and to inspire for every new generation so let us finally just remind ourselves of who it was all for and why in 1857 Benjamin Barker this wonderful auto D meticulous
Autodidact um from Leeds a Woolen manufacturer uh from uh leads journeyed to Manchester by rail you could do that in those days um to witness firsthand what an international exhibition could offer and he writes in his diary Rose at 6:30 went to leads by 714 train started
To Manchester by a special train at 835 by Huddersfield got to Art Treasure’s Exhibition at 12:40 got lunch outside Open brackets took it in my pocket went in at 1 inspected Museum of ornamental art until 2:00 2 till 3 in watercolor gallery 3 till 4 photographs 4 to five
Ancient and Modern Masters at 5:05 went out to the train got in started for home at 525 got to leads at 9:40 and could not get to Bramley until the 11:00 train where most museums today would be hard pressed to equal the kind of Outreach project that London Dublin and
Manchester married there remains to my mind much to learn from these spectacular gestur these great exhibitions of 1851 and 1853 thank you