Untitled (boy riding fake animal) c. 1950

Curator: This small black and white photograph from the Harvard Art Museums is called "Untitled (boy riding fake animal)" and is credited to Lucian and Mary Brown. There's a sweetness to it, almost a melancholy, wouldn't you agree? Editor: I see that too, a ghostly, distant memory, like a half-remembered dream. The boy astride the stylized bear becomes an emblem, almost, of innocence and lost play. Curator: Yes! The bear motif is so interesting. Bears, across cultures, represent so many things, from power and ferocity to nurture and protection. Here, it's a toy, domesticated, but the underlying symbolism lingers. Editor: Absolutely. And the child's gaze upward suggests longing, maybe for adventure, maybe for something just out of reach. The image becomes this poignant meditation on childhood's fleeting nature. Curator: It's a simple image but resonates on so many levels. Perhaps that's its power, to draw us into our own remembered experiences of childhood and the things we thought were real. Editor: Well, I know I'm now seeing my own childhood a little bit differently.