Gezicht op het administratiegebouw, ontworpen door Richard Morris Hunt op de World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893 1893

Editor: Here we have Charles Dudley Arnold’s albumen print from 1893, “Gezicht op het administratiegebouw, ontworpen door Richard Morris Hunt op de World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago.” The high vantage point gives a fantastic sense of scale and order to the architecture. What strikes you about it? Curator: The image immediately draws me to consider the construction and materials of the World's Columbian Exposition itself. This "White City" was intentionally designed as a temporary spectacle, a kind of built stagecraft. Look at the plaster construction, the (relatively) ephemeral nature of these grand buildings – they prioritize impact over permanence. Editor: So the material is almost secondary to the statement? Curator: Exactly! And consider the social implications. The exposition, while celebrating progress, was built on the labor – often exploited labor – of countless workers. We have to question whose progress was truly being celebrated, and at what cost? How did these workers contribute to the aesthetics displayed here? What were the physical realities of their labor, the conditions they endured? Editor: That’s a perspective I hadn’t fully considered. It’s easy to get caught up in the beauty and the grand vision. Curator: This isn't merely a picture of a beautiful building; it’s a document of material culture, a snapshot of a society grappling with industrialization, labor, and its own image. Also, consider the very medium of the albumen print—how did the production of this image itself involve material processes, skilled labor, and perhaps even a global exchange of resources? Editor: It definitely makes me appreciate the photo—and the event it captures—in a new light. Thanks for pointing that out. Curator: Likewise. Considering art from different viewpoints helps understanding!