Portret van M. Narball before 1900

Editor: Here we have "Portret van M. Narball," a mixed-media print from before 1900. It's striking how this piece functions as both a portrait and advertisement; you can clearly see whisky and theatre ads sharing space. How can we interpret its commentary on consumer culture, so early in the age of mass media? Curator: I am particularly interested in how the work presents different modes of production. You have the graphic art of advertisement, the photographic process of portraiture, and then the consumption these images are designed to trigger. It collapses high art and popular culture, blurring boundaries. What materials do you think would have been most costly, in terms of both time and resources, to produce? Editor: The photograph of M. Narball, likely, given photographic processes back then? Curator: Possibly, but also consider the printing itself. What kind of labor went into setting the type, operating the press? It speaks to a certain social infrastructure required to produce and distribute images like this, doesn’t it? Think of the skill of those typesetting and how it served marketing. Does that change the impact for you at all? Editor: I see your point. It's not just the art, it's the labor and means to spread it far and wide. Thanks for that fresh perspective. Curator: And thanks to you, I am rethinking how photography served not just representation but mass market dissemination of faces and commodities.