Leisure & water
The industrial capitalism of the 19th century was deeply linked to the development of precise timekeeping devices such as clocks and watches. As historian E. P. Thompson highlighted in his 1967 essay Time, Work-Discipline, and Industrial Capitalism, a new structure of the workday emerged, characterized by task specialization, hierarchical organization, and the gradual shift away from home-based labor. The widespread presence of clocks in workplaces, villages, and even homes was both a symptom and a catalyst of this transformation, reinforcing the rigid segmentation of time and its increasing control by employers within the evolving system of production and labor.
Over time, “clock time” gradually replaced the “natural time” that had previously governed workers’ daily lives. The Industrial Revolution was thus closely tied to a redefined conception of time—one that had to be measured, regulated, and optimized for productivity. In this context, the structuring of work was mirrored by the organization of leisure. Non-working hours were expected to be used efficiently, and with the rise of the leisure industry, the working classes were also able to take advantage of their free time in a more structured manner.
All the photographs in this selection feature figures in relation to water. While their contexts vary, each one offers a glimpse into moments of 19th-century leisure or the role of photographic instantaneity in shaping a new culture of measured time.
The women gazing out at the sea reflect how beaches became fashionable destinations for the upper classes, influenced by emerging beliefs in the health benefits of sea bathing. Meanwhile, the large group of people ice skating illustrates the widespread popularity of the sport, which captivated all social classes—from aristocrats to workers—amid a broader enthusiasm for winter sports. The young figures, reduced to calligraphic silhouettes against the winter landscape, evoke on a deeper psychological level the childlike wonder and excitement of the first snowfall. On another image, a man being rescued from the water evokes both the raw power of the element itself and the fact that swimming education remained uneven at the time. Finally, another man captured mid-dive in two stages, in a strikingly cinematic manner, recalls how photography was seen as an “horloge à voir” [clock to see] (Barthes, 1980, 33).
