Wallie Eddinger, from the Actresses series (N245) issued by Kinney Brothers to promote Sweet Caporal Cigarettes 1890

Curator: This albumen print, made around 1890, features Wallie Eddinger. It comes from the "Actresses" series created by Kinney Brothers to promote Sweet Caporal Cigarettes. What strikes you about this portrait? Editor: There's a haunting vulnerability about the figure. It looks like a child, but their expression carries a certain gravity. It’s fascinating and also deeply unsettling, almost confrontational in the gaze. Curator: The photograph as an object offers insight into late 19th century consumer culture, reflecting how products were marketed alongside idealized figures. It captures a transitional time, with early advertising techniques linking celebrity imagery with the promise of tobacco. What echoes of that historical approach might resonate today? Editor: Mass media as a conduit for defining and reinforcing cultural ideals comes immediately to mind. Consider how contemporary advertisements, like this portrait, construct celebrity around identity – especially in the commodification of young stars. Are we really that far removed from Kinney Brothers in our media landscape? Curator: It's potent to observe continuities in our collective fascination with the images of celebrated personas, which has shifted across mediums but always engages our psychology. Is there an uncanny quality you notice as we try to look past these familiar tropes of image-making? Editor: Absolutely, but in terms of Eddinger's attire, their almost roughspun shirt challenges conventional notions of glamor associated with “actresses.” There's something defiant and transgressive at play, unsettling preconceived notions of gender and performance, challenging assumptions around presentation and visibility that continues today. The image’s visual coding really stands out against norms. Curator: And thinking about "Sweet Caporal Cigarettes," how are tobacco-based products coded now, relative to then, considering ideas about harmful images in popular culture and celebrity performance? Editor: Yes! The cultural context flips now: contemporary media scrutinizes the health impacts, especially in regards to vulnerable figures such as child stars. Now the gaze carries awareness of their possible exploitation and is therefore more guarded. Curator: So much information conveyed through these modest visual and textual signs…It really challenges how we see photographic meaning-making. Editor: Right! Examining imagery across media is essential for deconstructing the norms that structure visibility itself!