Dutch Factory Girls: Photos from the Collection of the National Archive on View in Denmark
The First Art Newspaper on the Net    Established in 1996 Wednesday, December 25, 2024


Dutch Factory Girls: Photos from the Collection of the National Archive on View in Denmark
The photographs, in black and white, have been taken by members of Labour Inspection between 1900 and 1950.



ROTTERDAM.- Kunsthal Rotterdam presents a selection of those pictures that can be considered most extraordinary from a total of over 4000 photographs of Labour Inspection that are in the collection of the National Archives. The photographs, in black and white, have been taken by members of Labour Inspection between 1900 and 1950 in order to shed light on the poor working conditions, child labour, unsafe situations and occupational diseases. The pictures, showing workmen at machines, young girls in factories and home workers, are taken out of the archives for the very first time in over ninety years. Special attention is paid to the close-ups by Inspector Filarski, which form a clear exception to the more business like registrations made by his colleagues. Together, these photographs provide a realistic portrait of working conditions and branches of industry in the recent past.

Labour Inspection
At the end of the nineteenth century child labour still occurred regularly in the Netherlands, despite the famous Kinderwetje, a law imposing an end to child labour constituted by Van Houten (1874). To put an end to the evasion of the Kinderwet, extreme working hours and unsafe machine environments, Labour Inspection was established in 1890. It was the first independent service which visited factories and home workers, as well as outdoor workers, in order to check the age of labourers and inspect working conditions, safety and hygiene. From 1900 onwards it became customary to accompany the written reports by the inspectors with photographs. Once photographed, after all, the wrongs and consequences of accidents occurring at the work floor could no longer be easily denied. The purely business like registrations made by the inspectors were used as examples, proof or warnings and showed working life in the Netherlands in the first half of the twentieth century in a down to earth yet impressive manner.

Inspector Filarski
Jan Daniël Filarski (1884 -1969) joined Labour Inspection in 1916. He was a technical servant at the service, who dedicated himself to enhancing safety whenever and wherever people were working with machines. At the exhibition special attention is paid to the sober pictures by inspector Filarski that, taken with great empathy and eye for detail, form a pleasant exception to the more objective registrations of factories filled with young girls working at the assembly line, as taken by his colleagues. In careful compositions and with a low camera position he managed to capture the working conditions in the factories from extreme close-up. Filarski's in-company coverages are deliberately somewhat unclear, as a result of which they obtain a nostalgical character in which time has somehow been put to a standstill.












Today's News

October 20, 2008

Bruegel to Rubens: Masters of Flemish Painting Exhibition Opens at The Royal Collection

Roman Culture Brought to Life in Kunsthal Rotterdam Exhibition

Serial Landscape Photographs by Three Legendary Photographers on view at National Gallery of Art

Lucian Freud's Portrait of Francis Bacon Sells for 5.4 Million Pounds at Christie's

PAFA Is Only East Coast Venue for Peter Saul: A Retrospective

Film Society Mounts the Most Complete Retrospective of Polish Filmmaker's Work

Spectacular Paintings by Volanakis, Ralli and Gysis lead Sotheby's Sale of Greek Art in November

Dutch Factory Girls: Photos from the Collection of the National Archive on View in Denmark

October UBS 12 X 12 Presents Industry of the Ordinary at Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago

One Hundred Works by Latin American Artist Fernando Botero on View in Memphis

Spertus Museum Presents Double Vision Exhibition

A Major Exhibition of Paintings by George Tooker Presented at the National Academy Museum

The McNay Mounts a Major Retrospective of the Kinetic Sculptures of George Rickey

Exploring Surrealism, a New American Century and the Manipulation of Film Stock

Conversations in Clay at the Katonah Museum of Art

New sculpture in Babbidge Library to be dedicated Oct. 23




Museums, Exhibits, Artists, Milestones, Digital Art, Architecture, Photography,
Photographers, Special Photos, Special Reports, Featured Stories, Auctions, Art Fairs,
Anecdotes, Art Quiz, Education, Mythology, 3D Images, Last Week, .

 



Founder:
Ignacio Villarreal
(1941 - 2019)
Editor & Publisher: Jose Villarreal
(52 8110667640)

Art Director: Juan José Sepúlveda Ramírez
Writer: Ofelia Zurbia Betancourt

Royalville Communications, Inc
produces:

ignaciovillarreal.org juncodelavega.com facundocabral-elfinal.org
Founder's Site. Hommage
to a Mexican poet.
Hommage
       

The First Art Newspaper on the Net. The Best Versions Of Ave Maria Song Junco de la Vega Site Ignacio Villarreal Site
Tell a Friend
Dear User, please complete the form below in order to recommend the Artdaily newsletter to someone you know.
Please complete all fields marked *.
Sending Mail
Sending Successful