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I was struck by this post at Airform Archives some weeks back, in which comment was made on the art on the back of an old photograph being more interesting than the photographs on the front. I discovered yesterday that I appear to have a card by the same designer - the photography studio was located in Nebraska rather than Arkansas, but there are the same fine details, the same conflated Japanese and Chinese elements seen through Western eyes, and a central suspended device - in this case, a fan. Did the designer travel with a printing press, or was he centrally located in the corn belt? In placing these miniature worlds (the central panel showing the woman and child at the well is only half an inch tall), did the artist expect that they would live on after him? I think of the electrician in Mike Rose's Minds at Work , who braided electrical wire inside a wall, not because it was useful to do so, but because it was beautiful.

Edit: You are encouraged to click to enlarge. I'm just saying...