Untitled (party in laundromat, person inside washing machine) 1957

Curator: Here we have Jack Gould’s untitled photograph of a person inside a washing machine, currently residing in the Harvard Art Museums. Editor: My first impression is claustrophobia! That figure looks trapped, almost screaming within the cold, metallic confines of the machine. Curator: It's a fascinating play on domestic space and the human body. Laundromats are very specific socio-economic locations, and to see a person inside challenges our understanding of labor and class. Editor: Absolutely. Consider the material reality – the steel drum, the churning water usually present. It speaks to the labor of cleaning, but here inverted; the person, not the clothes, is being processed. Curator: Perhaps a commentary on the cyclical nature of work, or even the societal “washing away” of certain identities? Editor: Or the literal physical labor that goes into cleaning, made absurd. It's almost slapstick. Curator: It definitely provides a dark humor. Editor: Precisely! The inversion of familiar materials and activities into something unsettling… Curator: It really prompts us to consider the complex relationship between people and their environment.