John Stewart "Pop" Corkhill, Center Field, Cincinnati, from the Old Judge series (N172) for Old Judge Cigarettes 1888

Curator: This photograph from 1888 really pulls you in, doesn’t it? It's titled "John Stewart 'Pop' Corkhill, Center Field, Cincinnati, from the Old Judge series (N172) for Old Judge Cigarettes". It resides here at the Met. Editor: Sepia-toned, isn't it? And ghostly...makes me think of long-gone summer afternoons and the quiet rituals of baseball, you know? A real nostalgia bomb. Curator: Nostalgia certainly seems baked into the presentation here. Goodwin & Company captured Corkhill crouched, seemingly ready to scoop up a ground ball, mid-game perhaps, or during practice, with the ball in frame for posterity. Editor: Notice how the limited palette almost flattens the image? Yet the pose is so dynamic; his readiness to react pulls your eye. His outstretched arms, forming a sort of vector. And the light reflecting from the ball directs our attention immediately towards it. Curator: The stark lighting certainly serves that compositional focal point. He is leaning into it for sure. Also, this was more than a simple sports photo; it's an advertisement for Old Judge Cigarettes, connecting leisure, athletics, and, well, vice! Editor: A real marriage of disparate notions, hah! One wonders about the quality of the cigarette advertising and how people then reacted to this kind of fusion of baseball, the image, and tobacco advertising, right? Now the combination feels awkward, but the photograph still communicates athleticism... and that particular era's fascination with the photographic image itself. Curator: Indeed. There's also something about the materiality. The aged paper speaks to the ephemerality of it all... this was something printed to be discarded. It makes one think about preservation and legacy and our odd impulse to look back! Editor: Well, considering it's held in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, it's safe to say that something initially printed to be discarded, this relic now preserved, holds value because it carries memory; because it still manages to communicate even across over a century and because we, maybe in error, try to reconstruct a picture of baseball and the old ball game. I love it.