Fotoreproductie van een prent voorstellend de kroning van Napoleon Bonaparte en Josephine tot keizer en keizerin in de kathedraal de Notre-Dame te Parijs before 1891

Curator: Here in Gallery 14, we're looking at a photo reproduction of an engraving, titled "Fotoreproductie van een prent voorstellend de kroning van Napoleon Bonaparte en Josephine tot keizer en keizerin in de kathedraal de Notre-Dame te Parijs," dating to before 1891. Editor: It’s got this somber formality. A crowd scene squeezed into a rectangle—and the aging paper gives it an eerie distance. It looks very stagey. Curator: It captures a very particular historical moment. The print reproduces the grandeur and supposed legitimacy of Napoleon's reign through the neoclassical style, but reduced for mass distribution. Editor: I wonder how much the material form shaped its consumption. Photography capturing an engraving makes it more reproducible but it sacrifices the hand of the artist; does it lend authority, or dilute it? Curator: Mass production and circulation played a huge role, right? Here is Napoleon manipulating iconography, projecting a specific idea of power to his people but this process transforms it to another degree. It feels staged. Editor: Indeed! Looking at the work and considering its medium – a photo of an engraving, likely part of a book, perhaps – really grounds it. How and where was this image actually viewed and consumed by different segments of the population? Curator: That's right, this piece asks us to rethink how history is not only made but presented and then preserved, passed on, almost like a rumour—an impression—of power. It feels more removed somehow, more staged as well. Editor: It makes you consider what's truly being distributed: a record of an event, an echo of an artistic skill, or just an easily accessible icon? Curator: It’s the icon that lives on, I think, perhaps stripped of the initial artistic vision or intent and then re-imagined. I'm seeing the staged, dramatic display differently now. Editor: For me, it underscores the importance of the material in telling these complex stories—it shows how access shapes power.