Gezicht op Trondheim, gezien vanaf de oude hoofdweg Steinberget, Noorwegen 1873 - 1890

Curator: This stereo card presents us with a distant view of Trondheim, Norway. Knud Knudsen captured this landscape sometime between 1873 and 1890. It’s a reminder that photography wasn’t always the hyper-saturated, immediate medium we know today. Editor: You’re right. Looking at this print, a sepia-toned quiet washes over me. The town seems almost to blend into the soft, muted landscape, as though it’s nestled right into the embrace of the earth. Is that mist or just the printing technique adding to the distance? Curator: Probably a bit of both. Stereo cards were incredibly popular; this print would have been mass-produced. Think of it as the nineteenth-century’s version of virtual reality—a way for people to see faraway places in a three-dimensional view from the comfort of their homes. Knudsen capitalized on tourism, offering views that showed both the grandeur and the growing industrialization of Norway. Editor: That’s interesting. The “grandeur” is apparent with the flowing river cutting through the landscape, but where’s the industry? I’m looking closer now, and it’s almost obscured by the soft focus—little hints along the shoreline, perhaps? Curator: Precisely. He’s not foregrounding factories, but they’re there, impacting the vista, especially if you understand this photo in its time. Pictorialism as a movement used soft focus and other techniques, like manipulating prints, to give photography artistic weight and separate it from straightforward documentation. It was a struggle for artistic legitimacy. Editor: Absolutely. Knudsen, by softening those details and emphasizing light and shadow, invites us to contemplate not just a location, but also a feeling. You can almost hear the distant lapping of water against the shores. Curator: It's a carefully constructed image reflecting a specific desire for Norway’s image. This kind of controlled landscape helped construct a visual narrative of national identity. Editor: I like knowing that this humble card was someone’s portal to another world, viewed over and over, offering escape and wonder. Curator: And influencing ideas about what Norway looked like, one viewer at a time. A fascinating piece of visual culture, indeed.