The Friends of Wisbech Museum are hosting a free exhibition at the Wisbech and Fenland Museum from Saturday August 19 to October 21.
Curator Aldo Ierubino said: ‘“Self-Reflection/The Portrait and its uses’ is thought-provoking and draws on the museum’s extensive collection of artefacts to explore the range and contrasting uses of the portrait.
“Including, for the first time, a display of photographic portraits of the prisoners committed to Wisbech Gaol in the years between 1870-78.
“This social record of working class faces from Wisbech taken 140 years ago, act as a poignant reminder of changing values, which could at that time, commit a child of just ten years old, to twenty-one days of hard labour at the prison and five years in the reformatory, for stealing no more than a handkerchief.
Also on show will the rare icon of King Charles the Martyr, the monumental official portrait of Napoleon I in His Coronation Robes, as well as coins, medals, plaques, sculpture, death masks, porcelain, and paintings.
It will be open from 10am-4pm Tuesdays to Saturdays and 10am-4pm on Sundays.
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