Gezicht op de Dom in Palermo c. 1860 - 1880

Curator: Let's consider this photograph, "Gezicht op de Dom in Palermo" from sometime between 1860 and 1880, by Giorgio Sommer. It’s currently held at the Rijksmuseum. Editor: It's stunning! It looks like it was a stereoscopic photograph mounted on cardstock, based on how I’m seeing two nearly identical images next to each other. I’m intrigued by the way the architecture dominates the landscape. How do you interpret this work? Curator: I think we need to investigate this photo’s relationship to the modes of production and the prevailing socio-economic context. Consider the albumen print itself – a process involving egg whites to bind the photographic chemicals to the paper. It speaks to the burgeoning commercialization of photography at the time, doesn't it? And stereoscopic views like this were immensely popular souvenirs, feeding the demand for easily consumable images of foreign lands. Who had access to them, and why? Editor: So, it’s less about the artistic vision and more about how the photo becomes an accessible item, due to albumen? How this photograph catered to a growing consumer market eager to experience exotic locales without actually travelling? Curator: Precisely! This cathedral, captured for mass consumption, becomes a commodity. The labor involved, the materials sourced – they all speak to the systems in place that facilitated this image reaching European drawing rooms. The “Orientalist” aesthetic plays its part here too, packaging Sicily as this exotic ‘other’. Editor: So the image is about the exchange, commerce, and consumption. Interesting to think about it that way. Curator: What this helps reveal is that images, objects, spaces, and identities can and are, quite literally, created, fabricated, purchased and possessed. I'm going to need to visit the gift shop now. Editor: I guess I learned to consider photography as an exchange between social forces, not only a mere illustration of art.