News Release

A fissure fracturing a South of Market street. City Hall in rubble. A tent city in Golden Gate Park. These were some of the scenes captured by everyday people living in or visiting San Francisco on that fateful April 18, 1906 day when the great earthquake and fire destroyed the city. In a groundbreaking exhibition, Snapshot Chronicles: Inventing the American Photo Album explores the visual creativity, storytelling and folk artistry of the family photo album, with a special section on images from the 1906 earthquake and fire. The exhibition will be on display April 8–Aug. 20 in the Jewett Gallery at the Main Library.

Snapshot Chronicles underscores the impact that mass-market, inexpensive cameras, which emerged at the turn of the 20th century, had on ordinary people who could now record their lives in pictures. Unlike a single snapshot that focuses attention on a single moment, photo albums offered people the challenge of assembling their photographs into sequential narratives.The albums range from small, handmade jewels to thick, store-bought, faux-leather albums with black paper pages. Some albums are notable because the individual photographs are exquisite, revealing a surprising sophistication for the medium and its expressive qualities; other albums are remarkable as forms of folk art, with photos and other raw materials transformed into visual memorabilia. Albums of interest include those that chronicle the personal and professional life of an all-woman traveling circus, a mock wedding between two women and a love affair between Al Capone and his mistress.

The centerpiece of this exhibition features personal photo albums made by San Francisco residents and tourists to the City who witnessed and took photos of the 1906 catastrophe. Historical earthquake photographs and postcards from the Library’s San Francisco History Center will also be included in the exhibition. Private messages written on the front and back of the postcards combined with the amateur photographic documentation found in old family albums puts a human expression on a monumental natural disaster. “Rather a clean sweep, isn't it?” captures a tourist’s dark humor on a souvenir photographic postcard sent to Paris showing the ruins of South of Market. Another reads “Poor Old St. Mary's! Poor Old Chinatown! Glad you were all away” on a postcard of Old St. Mary's Church in Chinatown.

“The 1906 earthquake has become known to many primarily through mass-produced iconic images and historic headlines. This exhibition is unique because we’re showing a much more personal perspective. These photographs were not made for commercial purposes and have never before been seen by the public,” says curator Barbara Levine.

Snapshot Chronicles is culled from the collection of San Francisco resident Barbara Levine and organized by the Douglas F. Cooley Gallery at Reed College. A fully illustrated 200-page exhibition catalogue is co-published by Reed College and Princeton Architectural Press.


Related Program:
Exhibition walk-through and book signing with curator Barbara Levine.
2 p.m., Sunday, April 9
Jewett Gallery, Main Library
100 Larkin Street (at Grove Street)

This exhibition and program are free and open to the public.
For more information, please call (415) 557-4277.