The Auction House: The Auctioneer Possibly 1863 - 1920

Curator: What an energetic scene! So many figures, all tightly packed. You can almost hear the buzz of the crowd. Editor: Absolutely. Let’s consider “The Auction House: The Auctioneer.” This print, made by Charles Maurand sometime between 1863 and 1920, depicts exactly what the title suggests—an auction. We see an auctioneer mid-call, holding his gavel high, with a sea of faces gazing up at him. Curator: The faces! They’re a real mix, aren't they? What do we read in their expressions? Hope, greed, anticipation? It seems very class-based. Everyone has a hat and dark coats. It strikes me how economic status shaped access to these cultural and commercial spaces, who participates, and even whose image gets reproduced in art. Editor: It's interesting you note that—that reading resonates strongly. Look at the technical execution too, all these fine lines layered upon layered upon layer. And that leads to process: It must have taken hours to engrave this image. Someone designed, someone engraved, and someone else had to physically run the presses to produce the image. And it’s all done on paper, something once valuable. What do all those choices convey, not just materially but in terms of the work, the production needed to share an image like this? Curator: It really makes you consider labor, both artistic and more broadly in this context of exchange and value. Does this make art complicit in systems of economic disparity or a vehicle to resist them? Can you explore these ideas through your own relationship to production of art, in both physical terms, and the means with which you disseminate this art? Editor: Absolutely! And where this scene took place impacts what was consumed—what were these bidders looking for? Did it offer them power in that acquisition? Were these the elite of the era making capital? I am so intrigued to delve into the details. Curator: Yes! This print leaves me pondering not just who is included, but also those excluded from this world of art and commerce. Editor: For me, the art lives on in how that scene made an object of art that made these things circulate and live on to this very day.