Lillian Kennedy, from the Actors and Actresses series (N145-8) issued by Duke Sons & Co. to promote Duke Cigarettes 1890 - 1895

Curator: This albumen print, taken between 1890 and 1895, is from a series of photographs issued by Duke Sons & Co. to promote their cigarettes. It depicts Lillian Kennedy, an actress of the time. Editor: It’s sepia-toned and a little blurry, like a faded dream. She lounges in this opulent, somewhat fussy chair with what looks like a very fluffy duster dangling precariously. There’s a sense of staged intimacy, like we're catching her off-guard but, you know, in a totally posed way. Curator: Right, these cards were a form of early advertising, cheap to produce, inserted into cigarette packs to encourage sales and brand loyalty. Albumen prints were common then, valued for their sharp detail, but very labor-intensive requiring a coating of albumen - egg white - onto the paper. It straddles the line between commodity and artwork. Editor: It’s funny to think of a connection between fragile celebrity and… cigarettes! Seems a little scandalous now, but then, how else would they amplify Ms. Kennedy's appeal to a broader audience? It’s almost as if the cigarette and actress's 'glamour' were intertwined. Curator: Exactly! Mass production techniques enabled a wider distribution of images, making performers like Kennedy accessible to a public that might never see her on stage. It speaks to the rise of celebrity culture, enabled by these advances in printmaking and photography. Consider the shift in labor – from artisanal printmaking to industrial production; its profound impact of the image dissemination on wider scale! Editor: And doesn't she almost seem to know? Gazing not quite directly, like she knows this little image is traveling places, maybe becoming someone's small, treasured possession? I keep thinking about who picked up the cigarette pack, spotted Lillian and thought 'Yes. I like this'. What did *that* feel like? Curator: A nice personal observation which complements an understanding of albumen’s socio-economic impact during the shift into modern modes of artistic consumption and print production in mass society! Editor: Okay! It makes me think a lot about modern-day fleeting fame too – influencer culture and all that. Not so different after all? Curator: Indeed, and the piece is now held in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, adding a nice ironic twist to it's historical commodification! Editor: Huh, and now, by virtue of a quick look, we’ve kind of repeated that cycle... it does feel strange somehow.