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The Backlot Ledger

Notes on the trades, the seasons and the paper trail behind a public career

The look

Style as labour: styling, grooming, recovery and the business of being photographed.

Every entry in this ledger

1
A stack of early twentieth-century performer postcards on a wooden desk beside a magnifying glass and a paper ledger, soft window light from the left, shallow depth of field on the top card.

RC-001The look

When a Performer Becomes a Postcard

Press photos, postcard editions and fan mail turn a career into paper. How printed portraits of public figures are made, dated and priced by collectors.