Imagine a school, merely three rooms, located behind a church in East London; you walk along a dark alley, enter the school, and discover an art exhibition; the rooms are thronged with people, some reading catalogues, others looking and listening to guides while volunteers watch over the paintings and the people. This is not just any exhibition but the Whitechapel Fine Art Loan Exhibition: an extraordinary example of the power of art to effect social change.

The Whitechapel Fine Art Loan Exhibitions were established by Reverend Samuel Barnett (1844-1913) and Henrietta Rowland Barnett (1851-1936) to bring the best art to the people living in one of the poorest districts in London. For eighteen years, from 1881 to 1898, the Barnetts and a team of volunteers transformed St. Jude's School House on Commercial Street in Whitechapel, East London, into a temporary art gallery during the Easter holidays. The Whitechapel Fine Art Loan Exhibitions were extraordinarily successful and laid the groundwork for the opening of a permanent picture gallery, the Whitechapel Art Gallery (as it was then called), in 1901.

Now, for the very first time, you can visit the Whitechapel Fine Art Loan Exhibition and learn about a forgotten episode in the radical history of the Whitechapel Gallery.

1884 At the Whitechapel Exhibition reconstructs and reimagines the fourth year of the Whitechapel Fine Art Loan Exhibitions. From 9th to 20th April, the exhibition was open daily, 10 a.m. to 10 p.m., and 2 p.m. to 10 p.m. on Sundays. There was no fee for admission, and visitors could buy a descriptive catalog for one penny. The numbers are remarkable: 34,291 people came over 12 days to view 235 paintings displayed in St. Jude's School.

A crowded art exhibition in a Victorian-era gallery, with men, women, and children viewing framed paintings on the walls. People are dressed in 19th-century clothing and some are closely examining the artworks.
 

1884 At the Whitechapel Exhibition is curated by Professor Lucy Hartley, University of Michigan.

The website is designed by Clara Elpi, LSA Digital Scholarship Studio, University of Michigan. The 3D model is produced by Ben Mazza and Joe Grabowski at Sagenverse.

In partnership with
Whitechapel Gallery
Andrey Lazarev and Aiden Chen, past and present archivists

Supported by
University of Michigan
LSA Digital Scholarship Studio, LSA Research Office, and Office of the Vice-President for Research
With additional support from the Department of English Language & Literature, University of Michigan

Special thanks to the galleries, museums, and institutions who allowed the use of digital images from their collections without a license fee.