Card 47, Ornithoptera Brookiana, from the Butterflies series (N183) issued by Wm. S. Kimball & Co. 1888

Curator: Ah, "Card 47, Ornithoptera Brookiana, from the Butterflies series," created in 1888 by Wm. S. Kimball & Co. You can find it here at the Met. It's a drawing and print combination, one of a collectible series. Editor: It's immediately striking – this rather delicate, almost ethereal figure sprouting these magnificent, dramatic wings. The contrast is captivating. Curator: Consider its original context – these cards were inserted into cigarette packs! Meant to stiffen the packaging and, of course, be collected and traded. It really disrupts our modern notion of 'art'. The materiality of the cheap cardboard stock itself speaks volumes about consumption and disposable culture. Editor: It's quite the juxtaposition: a mass-produced commercial item using potent symbolism. The figure with butterfly wings evokes transformation and beauty but also, perhaps, fragility, especially juxtaposed with the rather gritty reality of a tobacco product. There’s a subtle layering of meanings here, right? The very form evokes classical figures and the tradition of winged angels. Curator: Exactly. It draws from both "high" and "low" culture. I am also quite fascinated by the printmaking techniques employed; it points to shifts in technology, and the democratization of image reproduction in this period. It wasn’t an 'original' work of art but a commercial reproduction available to almost anyone, and that democratisation, challenges the value judgements inherent to art. Editor: It's an interesting point. Think about the choice of the Ornithoptera Brookiana. A large, showy butterfly species itself becomes symbolic. The use of nature mirrors a rising romantic interest in science at that time but might be as simple as wanting an image to 'pop' out of cigarette boxes on shop shelves. The colours selected feel so alive, so electric even now! Curator: Well, perhaps that gets to the clever marketing tactics of the Wm. S. Kimball Company at the time. That the firm deployed colour reproduction so alluring and in such contrast, for a throw-away product of vice, seems almost tragic. Editor: Indeed, it makes us contemplate the fleeting nature of beauty and the unexpected places we find it, or project it, even within mass-produced commodities. Curator: Thinking about this image and its making definitely pushes us to reflect on our preconceptions of high art. Editor: I'll leave here pondering on what these striking visual motifs suggest and reveal about the human condition through culture.