Yesterday’s images in freezeframe

Apr 26 2008 by Laura Davis, Liverpool Daily Post

Whatever planners do our heritage is safe, thanks to photographer Stewart Bale. Laura Davis reports

POINTING their lenses at the picture palace looming out of the blue-black evening or capturing the serious expressions of electric cable workers, were the photographers aware of their part in preserving Liverpool’s history?

Or were their minds more focused on the steaming flask of tea they could enjoy once their task had ended, than on the eager gaze of later generations roaming over the black and white images in search of clues to the past?

Over seven decades, the employees of Stewart Bale Ltd amassed an archive of almost 200,000 negatives documenting Liverpool’s journey through last century – covering company days out, architectural triumphs, shop windows and Blitz damage. Each one a moment in time that would have been lost were it not for the firm’s meticulous cataloguing and storage.

Some of the pictures have become as well known as the sights they depict – a lone worker helping to build one of the Mersey Tunnels; a half-finished Liverpool Cathedral.

It is hard to imagine, now that these structures are so much a part of the fabric of the city, that once they had not existed, had to be constructed bottom up from new.

Almost easier to believe that, just before the shutter blinked, a giant sea serpent had raised its head out of the River Mersey and bitten off the top of the cathedral’s bell tower.

Without a gaze to enable them to fulfil their purpose, an unwatched photograph is like a tree falling in a forest with nobody to hear it.

And that is how the majority of the Stewart Bale archive has remained, in negative form deep inside giant freezers to preserve their quality, watched over by conservation experts at National Museums Liverpool.

UNTIL now, when around 50 of them have been carefully selected, researched and placed on display at the National Conservation Centre, where the public can enjoy their stark beauty.

“Liverpool’s history is what makes the photographs interesting,” says Jon Murden, NML’s curator of social and cultural exhibitions.

“We chose images that would give a good representation of Liverpool as a city coming to terms with the changes of the 20th century.

“Some of the images in this exhibition are ones people will recognise but we have also tried to show some that will never have been seen before.

“There are very few photographic collections that catalogue the economic and social development of a city for such a long period of time.”

Although we tend to think of Liverpool enjoying its boom days during the Victorian era and then declining until the turn of the 21st century, the Stewart Bale archive reveals a place and a people eager to embrace modernity, not dwell on past glories.

Many of the images chosen for the exhibition were taken in the 1930s and demonstrate the high hopes the city planners had for the future. From the elaborate decoration on Herbert Rowse’s towering ventilation shafts, shown with part of the Overhead Railway in the foreground, it is clear that Liverpool was still leading the pack – excited by the opportunities that would come with the new fast-pace of the 20th century.

When Liverpool needed a chimney to air its new underwater tunnel, it would be no ordinary chimney but a landmark on the skyline – an art deco monument to modern life.

Each new building spoke of ambition and the sleek and sophisticated shapes of the art deco movement were the perfect medium in which to express it. The New Brighton Lido and Wavertree’s Abbey Cinema were also created in this style and appear streamlined and immaculate in the photographs.

“That’s a really special photo for people of Liverpool of the generation that remembers going there as children,” says Jon, indicating a scene of the swimming pool’s opening ceremony in 1934.

“When it was built, outdoor activities were really fashionable, but instead of just building a Lido, Liverpool creates this great monument to swimming with piazzas and cafes and different levels.”

The Abbey Cinema, facing the Picton Clock and advertised as “The perfect cinema at last”, was completed five years later on a similarly grand scale.

The Stewart Bale image shows it burning bright in the darkness, beckoning you to step inside the photograph and queue for an ice-cream and a ticket to a Clark Gable film. It resembles a still from Metropolis, Fritz Lang’s 1927 futuristic movie about a dystopic city, which was the inspiration for the exhibition’s title.

“This picture sums Liverpool up,” says Jon. ”It was really at the forefront of cinema building in the 1930s, creating them with all mod-cons and amazing decoration. I understand the Abbey had a foyer with a parquet wooden floor with musical notes set into it.

“It provided a complete experience. You could watch a film but there was also an opportunity to have something to eat or a drink at the bar. It symbolised aspiration. It said these buildings are the future, this is where Liverpool is headed.”

Jon and a team from NML, including Anne Gleave, curator of photographic archives, spent months selecting which images would best represent the collection, limited by the archive’s vastness and by the format of some of the negatives.

Part of the process involved researching the images, locating them both geographically and in relation to Liverpool’s past.

They are hoping that visitors to the Conservation Centre might add their insights and are currently applying for funding to create a permanent online archive. Stewart Bale pictures will also feature in the new Museum of Liverpool when it opens in 2010.

“This exhibition shows what was a great Victorian city adapting to the 20th century and embracing modernity,” Jon concludes.

Many of its subjects have gone now – the Overhead Railway and New Brighton Lido casualties of short-sighted planning decisions and the Abbey still standing but, as a Somerfield supermarket, without its hypnotic appeal.

Yet in the Stewart Bale photographs they are there, symbols of a proud city looking towards the future with confidence.

METROPOLIS: Capturing Modern Liverpool is at the National Conservation Centre until August 10.

lauradavis