Burch, Left Field, Brooklyn, from the Old Judge series (N172) for Old Judge Cigarettes 1887

Curator: My first thought? Grit. I can almost smell the old tobacco. Editor: I'm delighted you mentioned that. The item we're observing, brought to us by Goodwin & Company in 1887, is a trade card—"Burch, Left Field, Brooklyn, from the Old Judge series (N172) for Old Judge Cigarettes," to be precise. These prints were inserted into cigarette packs as a form of advertisement. Curator: Ah, the pre-internet clickbait. This Burch guy is leaping – or rather, about to crash – after a ball. You can feel the effort; it’s kind of a beautiful, clumsy, desperate move. There is this immediacy of sports I think a painter of grander subjects wouldn't normally choose to include. It looks kind of candid, almost. Editor: Indeed, and this immediacy is facilitated by the then nascent technology of photographic printing which Goodwin seems to have utilized so efficiently. Notice how they have cleverly staged it—to maximize visual impact but also clearly readable graphic elements. There’s that lovely contrast of dark and light. The composition guides the eye directly towards the center to the action itself, and notice the curves—the bending form of the baseball player offset by the swoosh of the cigarette name. Curator: Yeah! It’s all angles and effort versus that elegant sweep of "Old Judge Cigarettes." What’s that tension saying? Enjoy life's elegant things while other poor saps crash for your entertainment? Harsh, maybe, but…effective marketing. Editor: Marketing predicated, of course, on the appeal and excitement generated by burgeoning baseball. A very modern sentiment contained within a deliberately limited and aged style, one of mass replication meant to convey an immediacy lacking in painting, at the expense of lasting vibrancy. It's almost ghostly, don't you think? Curator: That’s the heart of the magic! These were designed to be tossed, traded, degraded—like lives caught mid-leap. Still, looking at it, I imagine the Brooklyn stadium, the cheers, that fleeting moment of intense striving. A moment literally frozen in time! Editor: So, an art piece which paradoxically utilizes fleeting moments to generate an ageless commercial echo... Curator: …reminding us that beauty and ephemerality can coexist quite beautifully, don’t you think?