Union case (leeg) c. 1856

Curator: What strikes me immediately is the sense of intimacy, a whisper from the past contained within these two small wooden frames. Editor: This is a Union case dating from around 1856, most likely made to house a daguerreotype. It was designed by Samuel Peck. Daguerreotypes were early photographs on silver-plated copper and this case was designed to protect such portraits. The mixed media element comes from the case construction itself and the photographic processes inside it. Curator: Right, so a tiny temple, almost. To immortalize a gaze, a smirk. The blank circle today is haunted with all the potential faces lost to time. Was it always empty, do you think? Editor: No, it most likely contained a portrait once upon a time. The Union case itself is quite important here: note the text, identifying its origin and materials as an "improved" product, secured under patents. What interests me about objects like this is what they say about consumption, labor, and identity in a specific era. It is a physical, textual assertion of industry, and an assertion of wealth; daguerrotypes weren't available to everyone. Who would the portrait have been of? Curator: A beloved... maybe a daughter or father. Looking into their eyes across a gulf of centuries. I imagine them gazing back at me now. Melancholy, isn’t it? All this delicate preservation for something so easily… vanished. That contrast – ambition versus fragility – really stirs something in me. What was daily life like for someone who sought out something like this? Did it change them? Editor: Exactly! What was the photograph *for*? Was it meant as a display of affection or aspiration? Given that Samuel Peck's cases themselves were mass-produced under particular patents, this tells us that it might have represented, on a deeper level, the move to create and own the means of creating and circulating images of loved ones and self-expression that was developing around this period. Think how revolutionary this act was. It is hard for us, today, saturated by media as we are. Curator: A revolutionary act. A potent one, in miniature. Looking closer... you are completely right. What an uncanny relic! Editor: Indeed. Thanks for sharing your imaginative outlook! Curator: And thank you for putting it into this very important context!