Gezicht op het administratiegebouw, ontworpen door Richard Morris Hunt op de World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893 1893

Editor: This gelatin-silver print captures Richard Morris Hunt's Administration Building at the 1893 Chicago World's Fair. I find its composition and use of light so captivating. What do you see when you look at this photograph? Curator: I see a carefully constructed image, where the value lies not just in what's depicted, but in how the image itself becomes a commodity. The gelatin-silver print process allowed for mass reproduction, democratizing access to architectural wonders, albeit in a mediated form. The building isn’t just a building, it's also labor. Editor: Could you expand on that, labor being a part of the material? Curator: The building materials had to be harvested, processed and transported. Each part from lumber to the iron has people involved, their effort put into material transformation for consumption. The photograph freezes all the human activity it took to produce it, turning it into this finished view of triumphant architectural commodity. Editor: So the print flattens out a bunch of labour into something pleasing and picturesque. I suppose there is also labour involved in pictorialism in the staging and dark room. Curator: Exactly! Consider also the labor conditions, pay, and social structures surrounding these processes. Whose stories aren't we seeing here? It's not simply an architectural record, but a record of industrial and social conditions presented through a lens–pun intended–of progress and beauty. Editor: It sounds like a powerful critique that connects aesthetics with production and social inequality. I never would have thought about that! Curator: Seeing art through the lens of labor helps us uncover those power structures hidden beneath seemingly objective or beautiful surfaces. There is so much to learn if we really consider that every single material good has to be made!