Miss Clara Downes, from the Actors and Actresses series (N171) for Old Judge Cigarettes 1886 - 1890

Editor: This is "Miss Clara Downes," a photographic print created between 1886 and 1890 by Goodwin & Company. It seems so…staged. Almost like a painting mimicking a photograph, meant to be widely distributed with cigarettes. What do you see when you look at it? Curator: It’s fascinating how popular imagery was used to sell products. Cigarette cards, like this one, featuring actresses like Miss Clara Downes, became ubiquitous. Think about the politics of display here: this was mass-produced, readily available. It blurs the lines between art, commerce, and celebrity culture. Does this feel like a celebration of female performers to you, or is something else going on? Editor: Well, the setting feels rather artificial and performative. She's clearly posing. So, it makes me wonder if it was really *for* women. Was the target audience for Old Judge cigarettes primarily men? Curator: Exactly. Consider the power dynamics at play. A male-dominated industry using a woman's image to sell their product. The “actress” is being consumed visually along with the cigarettes, isn’t she? What does it tell us about how women performers were valued at that time? It brings up complex questions of objectification and agency, doesn’t it? Editor: It does. I guess I was initially taken by the "Old Timey" aesthetic, but seeing it in terms of power shifts the focus quite a bit. I never really thought about these cards that way before. Curator: That’s the key, isn't it? To consider not just what the image *is*, but what it *does* and *who* it's doing it to. The image functions in the sphere of a certain product. Its intent has certain historical effects and contexts.