The Spirit of the White Cube

Photo by pure julia on Unsplash

I’ve been cooking this idea since a long time ago; well, not that long honestly. It all started in 2017 when I studied a brief yet dense course on Curation imparted by An Paenhuysen. Here I learned among several curation related stuff about the existence of a term, the White Cube.

There has been some serious of deep thinking around the philosophy of the White Cube as a social scenario or a cultural product. But today I won’t dig deep into that, and I just want to talk about one thing. That thing is the big necessity there is for photography to be showcased in a way that reflects the purpose of the White Cube.

So, What is the White Cube in the First Place?

Something oddly curious happens when we build a place bounded to exhibiting objects “far away” from the outside world. This has been a common practice among humanity, and we can see it throughout its own history. Humans have been building places with the specific purpose of showcasing (and also revering) objects that have been produced with an aesthetic ontology in mind.

As the twentieth century unraveled itself, a curious thing happened to various art galleries and even museums worldwide. These spaces where ripped off from any architectural artifact that could possibly distract people from contemplating the objects displayed inside their walls. This common practice…