Untitled (children playing with blocks) c. 1950

Editor: This interesting photograph, "Untitled (children playing with blocks)" by Lucian and Mary Brown, captures two children at play. The negative format highlights the materiality of photography itself. What stands out to you? Curator: Notice the texture; the rug, the children's clothes, the blocks themselves. All made, purchased, used. How does the labor of creating these objects, and the subsequent consumption and play, reflect societal values around childhood and domesticity? Editor: That's a perspective I hadn't considered. So the focus is less on the children themselves, and more on the world of objects that surrounds them? Curator: Precisely. The image becomes a document of material culture and the processes that create it. It's a commentary on the constructed nature of childhood.