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Breaker Boys Are No Longer Needed, This Is A Modern Breaker

Lewis Wickes Hine, 1930

1.70 m

Both at true scale.

17 cm × 12 cm

About the size of your phone. You would need 10 of them to reach a person's height.

Against things you know the size of

Height: 12 cm
Width: 17 cm
Medium: Gelatin silver print
Kind: Photograph
Made in: United States
Where the measurement comes from: Measured by the museum. The dimension is the one recorded by the institution that holds the work.
As the museum records it: 11.7 × 16.8 cm (4 5/8 × 6 5/8 in.)
Credit: Gift of David Vestal

Five questions, answered from its own record. What is AGAI?

How big is it?: 17 cm × 12 cm. About the size of your phone. Measured by the museum.
When was it made, and when is it everyone’s?: Made 1930. In the United States, works published in 1930 came into the public domain on 1 January 2026. It hangs in that year's Public Domain Day room.
Whose is it?: Everyone’s to see. It is held by The Art Institute of Chicago: Gift of David Vestal.
How was it made?: Gelatin silver print, made in United States.
Who speaks for it?: Its record at The Art Institute of Chicago. Measured by the museum. This gallery adds nothing it cannot cite.

One email. The smallest thing in the collection, the largest, and two that hang well together.

Scored on colour, shape, era and scale, the same way the gallery hangs them.