Card Number 348, Leonda Jarcaw, from the Actors and Actresses series (N145-5) issued by Duke Sons & Co. to promote Cameo Cigarettes 1880s

Editor: This is Card Number 348, featuring Leonda Jarcaw, from the Actors and Actresses series, dating to the 1880s. It's a promotional print from Duke Sons & Co. for Cameo Cigarettes. It strikes me as a really curious blend of portraiture and advertisement. What do you see in it from your perspective? Curator: For me, the most interesting aspect is its function as a commodity. It collapses the distance between the glamorous image of an actress and the everyday act of smoking. The materiality of the card itself - the paper, the ink, the printing process - is crucial. It was mass-produced, distributed with cigarettes, meant to be collected, traded, and consumed like the tobacco it advertised. Think about the labour involved. Editor: So, you're saying the value isn't necessarily in the artistry of the portrait, but in the card’s role in this wider system of production and consumption? Curator: Exactly! We have to consider the working-class origins of mass-produced ephemera like this. The card transforms the actress, Leonda Jarcaw, into a sign, something to be bought and sold. Consider what it means that her image, her likeness, is reduced to an easily reproduced commodity meant to encourage people to purchase a product. The card itself had to be affordable, and so inexpensive processes had to be implemented in its creation. Editor: That's fascinating. I hadn't really thought about it in terms of labor and industrial processes before. Curator: It challenges that divide between "high art" and these more populist forms of visual culture, demonstrating a different system of artistic patronage and distribution that relied on appealing to a broader consumer base. It’s also a photograph turned print – consider that transformation and its democratizing effect. Editor: I see your point. It really reframes how I look at these kinds of collectible cards. Instead of just seeing a pretty picture, I'm now thinking about the whole economic and social system behind it. Curator: Precisely. By thinking through materials and processes, we realize that the actress is not the art; but the commodification and popular distribution of her likeness are aspects that can, and perhaps should, be seen as elements of it.