Paperweight 1848

Curator: At first glance, I see the whole world trapped inside a glass bubble, as if suspended in time. Editor: That’s an intriguing start. We’re looking at "Paperweight," crafted around 1848 by Baccarat Glassworks, currently housed at the Art Institute of Chicago. It’s a wonderful example of decorative art using glass as its medium, embracing some Art Nouveau sensibilities. Curator: The intricate details are amazing; many contained symbols are trapped within it. Do you see, several of them contain tiny silhouette depictions of animals, like lambs and dogs? The little figures represent innocence, gentleness and are often associated with domesticity. What do the materiality and process tell you about the culture of this time? Editor: The production of this detailed millefiori paperweight signals a time of increasing industrial capabilities alongside aspirations for refinement in everyday life. Glass production involved intense labor and specialized skills. Notice how each tiny component—those colourful rods, the precise placement within molten glass—demands skilled labor and strict divisions of labor. And for whom were these objects intended? Curator: Ah, there is where social context comes in. Paperweights were popularized as novelties for the rising middle class and gentry, signaling literacy, taste, and access to luxury goods. Glass symbolizes clarity, light, and even transformation—encapsulating the Victorian-era obsession with preservation, whether in art or life. Each one captures memory, a desire for preservation. The paperweight encapsulates memory itself, and the aspirations and status of a time of rapid cultural change, fixed under glass. Editor: Exactly. What was once precious and difficult to craft became something relatively widespread. The embedded imagery speaks to nostalgia but also a democratizing impulse. How did you find it engaging, overall? Curator: As a concentrated universe, a little snow globe holding so much more. It serves as an artefact reflecting its Victorian origins. A world captured inside glass and brought here into the present. Editor: And on the level of process? I was really stuck thinking about human interaction here—the hot furnace, breath control, teamwork...