Exposing the Nation: Histories of Photography in Chile, 1860–1960 (Illuminations: Cultural Formations of the Americas)

Is photography a Eurocentric practice that others its subjects? In Exposing the Nation, Matthias Pfaller makes the case with a review of a national historiography of photography and images produced in Chile over the course of a century. There are multiple photographies, and they have a variety of uses: science, politics, tourism, family traditions, ethnology, art. They appear in a diverse array of media: government albums, family albums, mass-produced postcards, exhibition prints, scientific records, and published books.

Pfaller demonstrates the versatility of photography on the one hand, and the ways in which the national paradigm and modern historiography influenced the production and reception of photographic images on the other. It becomes clear that “national photography” is not a genre of its own, manifest solely in specific discourses. Rather, the nation, photography, and history are meta-discourses that pervade the very idea of Chile as represented through photography and the photographic image.

"Meticulously researched and documented, Exposing the Nation makes an original and interdisciplinary contribution to the fields of photography studies, Latin American studies, and nation building. Pfaller has gathered stunning visual materials from archives, museums, albums, and the business and scientific sector, disseminating them for a specialized as well as a general readership."
Marcy Schwartz, Rutgers University