Photographs are both things and ideas. Before they were pixels on a smartphone or stashed up in the cloud, photographs were objects printed on tangible goods. Individually or as multiples, they were treasured, touched, written on, and sometimes torn in anger, their physical fragility paradoxically underscoring their emotional power.

The notion of objective truth remains complicated in photography. Most people understand that pictures cannot be separated from who made them, and why; where they were taken, and whether the people or places contained in them had a say in their making. Someone’s finger was and always has been on the shutter.

Presenting a range of photographic objects, from historic postcards, coffee cans, and pajamas to fine-art prints, this exhibition provides a new view of the material potential of photography to shape our world.