Portret van een baby met halsketting en armbanden 1863 - 1903

Curator: Look at this charming photographic portrait by De Lavieter & Co., dating from somewhere between 1863 and 1903. It's called "Portrait of a Baby with Necklace and Bracelets." Editor: Heavens, the weight of adornment! Poor dear looks like she's heading to a tiny financier's meeting. The light is remarkably soft though. It's like a dream of lace and gravity. Curator: Well, thinking of material production, you have to consider what those adornments *mean*. I see this not as ostentatious necessarily, but symbolic—claiming a position, wealth inherited—visual claims of privilege literally weighted down on a baby’s soft frame. Editor: Ah, yes, but I am feeling how strange to burden an innocent. Don't you think babies are these miraculous blank slates? Imagine a life predetermined by those accessories. So heavy and sad to contemplate. It robs the child's portrait of light and levity, the basic freedoms of childhood! Curator: True, childhood became a powerful symbol around the same time—an innocence and freedom increasingly commodified by a rising middle class and industrialized societies who consumed it. That dress likely manufactured—the trinkets…I would be curious to analyze their chemical makeup. The materiality betrays everything! Editor: A fascinating read! So the materials and artistry become like little breadcrumbs back to a social-historical reality…For me, as a viewer, I simply wish someone would have removed all of it and just let that baby play in the sun! Curator: And I wish my lab were here to analyze the composition of this albumen print. Editor: But until then, we can always keep dreaming what she dreams.