*Shaping the Imperialist Imagination* invites visitors to explore the captivating world of early stereographic photography—a 19th-century innovation that offered viewers a vivid, three-dimensional glimpse of the world long before cinema or television. These immersive images transported audiences across continents, allowing them to “travel” from the comfort of their parlors. Yet beneath their wonder and novelty, they subtly conveyed ideas of cultural hierarchy, reinforcing a distinctly Western vision of power and progress.
Drawing from the California Museum of Photography’s rich holdings, this exhibition traces how stereographic imagery shaped the American imagination during a period of expansion and empire. With each paired image and lens, viewers were presented with scenes from American territories, Native lands, and European colonies—scenes that reflected not only distant geographies but also the biases and ambitions of those behind the camera. Through these photographs, a visual language of superiority and otherness was constructed, one that quietly informed how Americans perceived the wider world and their place within it.
Curated by a team of UCR undergraduates as part of their capstone seminar in the History of Art, the exhibition offers a contemporary perspective on how images once meant for entertainment became tools of ideology. By reexamining these artifacts today, the students illuminate the ways “armchair travel” both fascinated and conditioned its audiences, revealing how photography’s early promise of access and understanding was intertwined with exclusion and control.
Under the guidance of Associate Professor Susan Laxton and coordinating curator Alyse Yeargan, *Shaping the Imperialist Imagination* reflects a new generation’s critical engagement with the past. It encourages viewers to look closely—not only at what these photographs depict, but at what they teach us about vision, power, and the enduring influence of the images that shaped a nation’s worldview.
Image: Unknown Photographer, Underwood & Underwood Co. A Cuban Family, Havana, Cuba not dated Gelatin Silver Print, Keystone-Mast Collection at UCR ARTS 1996.0009.X6514
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