stereographic video and found stereo photo
in collaboration with: Sámuel Leó Kirk
— PHOTO/MODEL Images between Art and Nature, Hungarian University of Fine Arts, 2016
Pretty factory girls decorating cheap pottery for the foreign markets
I found a stereoscopic photo collection called School room travel published by Underwood & Underwood from 1904. The series offers the “tours of all lands” for schools, and they show the world through labor typical for certain places. Several images depicted child labor, like the Pretty factory girls decorating cheap pottery for the foreign markets, Kyoto, Japan. I asked Sámuel Leó Kirk, a student from the target age of the School room travel, to discuss the photo.
The teacher’s guide recommends the following questions for the “field work”:
“Compare the vases manufactured mainly for sale in Japan with those for exportation. Does the Western world or the Japanese public possess the finer taste? Is the foreign demand for Japanese wares tending toward the advancement or deterioration of applied art in Japan? Cheap pottery? Had you rather have one truly beautiful vase, or several gaudy ornaments of the same total cost?” / Geography Through the Stereoscope, Students field guide by Philip Emerson, Underwood and Underwood, New York, London, 1907
The teacher’s guide recommends the following questions for the “field work”:
“Compare the vases manufactured mainly for sale in Japan with those for exportation. Does the Western world or the Japanese public possess the finer taste? Is the foreign demand for Japanese wares tending toward the advancement or deterioration of applied art in Japan? Cheap pottery? Had you rather have one truly beautiful vase, or several gaudy ornaments of the same total cost?” / Geography Through the Stereoscope, Students field guide by Philip Emerson, Underwood and Underwood, New York, London, 1907
