Art Matters Lecture: Britt Salvesen

The View-Master is one of the most familiar, yet least investigated, formats of stereoscopic photography. Britt Salvesen, Curator and Head of Photography and Prints and Drawings at LACMA, outlines its history, from its invention and debut at the 1939 New York World’s Fair to its 21st-century reinvention as a virtual reality system. After considering key products and marketing strategies, Salvesen also suggests some reasons for the View-Master’s absence from histories of mass visual culture and its enduring popularity among children and collectors alike.