Untitled Valentine (Cupid on the Back of a Dog) 1850s

Curator: Well, this piece immediately makes me think of whispered secrets and lace handkerchiefs. There’s such a delicate, almost ethereal quality to it. Editor: Indeed. What we're looking at is "Untitled Valentine (Cupid on the Back of a Dog)," dating back to the 1850s. Attributed to George Meek, this charming valentine combines drawing and relief printing on paper. It's part of the collection here at the Art Institute of Chicago. Curator: A dog carrying Cupid—is there anything more delightfully absurd? I find it funny; it tickles my heart, it suggests the lightheartedness that’s meant to be found within love, beyond romance's more serious notes. Editor: Absolutely. Valentine's cards were gaining immense popularity then, and the imagery taps into both classical mythology with Cupid and Victorian sentimentality with, well, almost everything else. Mass production allowed for increasingly ornate and individualized expressions of affection, a sign of societal shifts in courting customs as industrial technology impacted courtship culture. Curator: It’s a bit like a dream… where you remember bits and pieces, rather than seeing clearly a whole vision, an echo of romantic sentiment in a way? Look closer and its like the card *itself* has feelings about love! There's an honesty here in not being perfect... you could easily imagine that even with its mass production... its almost one of a kind. Editor: Yes! The textures and the subtle impressions—you feel the craft and you can see the layers here, how a person could make one... how one person COULD make one! It represents this weird intersection of industrialization *and* handcrafted sentiment; as an industry expands, one wonders what kind of labor produced images of intimate connection. What were they feeling about the sentiments that the object represented. Curator: That thought in itself puts an idea in your head… it is rather mind blowing! Maybe… like love itself—complex and perhaps not *always* perfect—I keep coming back to that almost smudged impression of real feelings on fancy decorative love work. Editor: An imperfect impression of perfect romance. I like that as a description. It reminds us that even within highly stylized forms of expression, genuine emotion finds a way through, doesn’t it? Curator: Absolutely, this little piece… so well... It feels less like art, and more like magic of romance. I'd want one! Editor: I can understand why!