[Broadway with horse-drawn carriages] 1858 - 1862

Curator: This is a gelatin silver print from between 1858 and 1862, attributed to Edward Anthony, and it's titled [Broadway with horse-drawn carriages]. It captures a bustling cityscape in remarkable detail. Editor: My initial impression is the overwhelming busyness. The scene is crowded with activity. I am thinking about all the hands that would have constructed the carriages, tailored the suits. All that hidden labor. Curator: The photograph’s technical process also speaks to the moment in time. Note the stereoscopic format; it’s almost like looking through a window. In that period, photography was striving to capture and reproduce reality in great detail. Consider what the city signified, as the modern ideal was blooming across Europe and the United States. What do you see of its influence? Editor: Absolutely, and if we focus on the materiality, this gelatin silver print involves a complex chemical process of coating a substrate – likely glass initially, then paper - with light-sensitive emulsion. You had artisans preparing the materials, photographers operating bulky cameras, and developing teams in darkrooms, it speaks to the labor-intensive nature of early photography. It becomes an archive of manufacture and craft as much as one of progress. Curator: I'm also drawn to the symbols that linger. Broadway represents progress, commercial exchange. There are some individuals on foot. How did they perceive their place in society? These images are more than just aesthetic exercises, aren’t they? They also provide windows into social structures, to ambition. Editor: And who exactly consumes them and to what end? Because to make sense of a burgeoning capitalist project, we also have to trace production cycles to grasp photography’s commercial life. Photographs like these could be sold and re-sold. We begin to unearth deeper stories about this piece of urban culture. Curator: A photograph that captured more than a single moment of material culture or urban space, then; I'll be taking a look at this artwork in new light, paying closer attention to those details from now on! Editor: Precisely. By analyzing materials, methods, and consumption practices, we gain access to how this particular photograph participates in a complex system of social exchange.