Flowers 

Henri Fantin-Latour made this painting, "Flowers," using oil on canvas, a common practice in the 19th century. But the real story here is about the flowers themselves. They are a commodity. Flowers were being cultivated on an industrial scale in the 19th century, and sent to the urban centers, to meet the growing demands of a wealthy bourgeoisie for decoration. Fantin-Latour would have acquired them from the market, and arranged them in his studio. Notice how they have been placed in a humble brown vase, their beauty is amplified against the dark background. The brushstrokes are loose and painterly, and the flowers are depicted with a remarkable attention to detail. Look closely and you can see the different textures and colors of the petals, the way the light catches the edges of the leaves. They are elevated, they are immortalized. This piece encourages us to see the value of the painting not just in the image it represents, but in the materials, labor, and systems of commerce that made its creation possible.