Millpond 

Editor: We're looking at "Millpond", a photograph by Devin Leonardi. It shows a nude figure by a dark pool of water under a starlit sky. There's a stark stillness to it. What do you see in this piece? Curator: It strikes me as an exploration of the photographic medium itself. Look at how Leonardi employs photography here not to merely represent a scene, but to engage with its material construction. Consider the darkroom processes, the manipulation of light-sensitive materials. Were alternative processes involved? Editor: That’s interesting. I hadn't really considered the darkroom aspect of it. How does that impact your reading? Curator: I wonder about access to resources, and choices the artist made given resource constraints. How do such practical considerations shape artistic decisions about scale and process? Further, it prompts us to question who has traditionally been able to represent the nude body, and in what contexts? Editor: You're saying that Leonardi's choice of photography, its inherent processes and history, influences how we perceive the scene, the figures, even the landscape itself? Curator: Precisely! It’s not just about *what* is depicted, but *how* it's depicted, and what social systems enable and constrain the artist's labour. Editor: That's given me a completely different perspective on this image, thank you! I am thinking more now about the role of the artist in shaping our interpretation, both aesthetically and materially. Curator: Absolutely. Thinking materially expands how we interpret this moment, connecting it to labor and production in ways that simple visual analysis overlooks.