All He Had, from the Snapshots from "Puck" series (N128) issued by Duke Sons & Co. to promote Honest Long Cut Tobacco 1888

Curator: This piece, dating back to 1888, is titled "All He Had," and it’s from the series "Snapshots from 'Puck'" created by W. Duke, Sons & Co. Editor: There’s a strange sense of restrained glee in this work; the slightly awkward perspective adds to a quaintly humorous moment captured in coloured pencil and print. Curator: The artist is primarily known as a manufacturer rather than for their artistry; this piece was issued by Duke Sons & Co. as a promotional item for their Honest Long Cut Tobacco. Editor: Fascinating, to see the mechanics of tobacco production intersecting with popular visual culture. One wonders about the factory workers producing these images in tandem with the tobacco. Was it considered art, or mere industrial product? Curator: Semiotically, the caricature performs its cultural function in two registers; firstly, the upper-class consumer, signified by the tall hat, contrasted against the shopkeeper in his servitude. Editor: Precisely! I’m drawn to how the objects - the oranges, boxes, even the barrel – are rendered. They seem more about repetition and accumulation; commercial exchange as spectacle! Consider the artist's method and what he truly “pictured”. Curator: Indeed, the dialogue inscribed just below is also an interesting detail here. I quote "What have you got in the shape of oranges?" to which the shopkeeper replies: "All round ones, sir". There is definitely something worth noting in its emphasis. Editor: This tension, that strange question with an equally perplexing response, suggests a critique of commodification itself – reducing vibrant organic produce to just "round ones." The flattening, or maybe, rather the “rounding” of experience that is typical to the art of the age. Curator: The artist's rendering contributes as much, too: simplified figures set against rudimentary lines which produce forms, but devoid of personality and even feeling. Editor: I'd add that considering it originally came with tobacco packaging underscores a critical examination of materiality: ink and coloured pencil employed toward the proliferation of a stimulant that also requires labour, manufacture and distribution to be effective. It creates a complex circuit between enjoyment and economy. Curator: Quite. Its engagement across mediums creates many openings to question our understanding and relation to commodities themselves. Editor: I agree; it's more than just consumerism. It asks one to reconsider what it means to exist materially; that such an innocuous item is a consequence of labor, promotion, as well as mass media of its period, complicates how a coloured pencil can achieve so much.