Category:Seeded crowds containing tableaux vivants

Seeded crowds containing tableaux vivants are deserving of more research. In the early years of photography, they were a Continental (European) phenomenon. They featured "found" and un-directed public crowds, with stationary actors scattered among them, and photographed for an audience who enjoyed searching photographs with hand-lenses. Examples of Continental seeds within crowds are a little boy urinating, and a pickpocket.

They were and are a rare thing in the UK. It so happens that in 1913, Marcel Duchamp was in Herne Bay, Kent, England, visiting his sister who was studying English there. One of his works, the Large Glass, contains a photo of Herne Bay Pier by Fred C. Palmer, who was a main newspaper and postcard photographer of Herne Bay at the time. That visit by Duchamp may possibly explain what motivated Fred C. Palmer to create a seeded crowd photograph. It would have taken a great deal of planning and organisation, and perfect timing of the regatta starting gun and the running boy. There are clues that Duchamp and his sister are in the photograph - the cyclist girl is wearing black stockings, which in England were only worn by servants, but in France were favoured by actresses. The big, broad-shouldered "woman" facing her and wearing Rrose Sélavy's hat could well be Rrose Sélavy before Man Ray ever photographed "her". Storye book (talk) 10:34, 9 May 2021 (UTC)