Graduate seminar curates exhibition of photographs of ordinary Americans

These real photograph postcards of unidentified studios and sitters are from the collection of Jan Jennings, which is on view at the Johnson Museum. The photo on the left is circa 1907-14; the one at right is pre-1923. Courtesy of the Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art

The Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art at Cornell is presenting the exhibition "Time and a Chair," which is on view through Oct. 3.

Curated by Cornell Associate Professor Jan Jennings' graduate seminar in design theory and criticism, the exhibition pairs historical photographs from the late-19th century to the mid-20th century to compare person, pose, chair and time, provoking speculation about the people, settings and stories and asking viewers to frame their own questions.

"There is a familiarity about these pictures," said Jennings. "The poses are traditional, referring to 16th-century European fine-art paintings. The pictures express middle-class aspirations, and we imagine that many of the pictures were taken at special moments, some of which were not celebratory."

Through eBay, Jennings acquired about 150 photographs of "ordinary interiors of underrepresented people in remote parts of the country" with support from a U.S. Department of Agriculture Hatch grant. The photographs were then classified and cataloged by a 2003 design theory seminar class. Following an exhibit of enlarged reproductions that same year in the Martha Van Rensselaer Hall Gallery on campus, Jennings was approached by Frank Robinson, the Richard J. Schwartz Director of the Johnson Museum, to design an exhibition for the museum using the original photographs.

The spring 2004 class has applied concepts of interior design to the exhibition, experimenting with spatial form and behavior. Photographs are hung on one wall in the exhibition gallery to view while standing, and on the other wall photographs are hung lower, encouraging visitors to sit on provided stools to look at the images.