A tea field near Adams Peak c. 1900

Curator: This photograph, taken around 1900 by Henry William Cave, depicts a tea field near Adam's Peak. The gelatin-silver print captures the workers amongst the fields, with the mountain looming in the background. Editor: It has an incredibly unsettling calmness for an image so clearly portraying exploited labor, doesn’t it? The mountain feels both majestic and indifferent, dwarfing the figures below. Curator: Absolutely. Consider the colonial context. Cave was a commercial photographer catering to a European audience, presenting an image of Ceylon, now Sri Lanka, that emphasized its exotic beauty and economic productivity. This photo actively normalizes colonial enterprise. Editor: So, the “beauty” obscures the reality of the tea pickers. They become picturesque elements, softened to palatable consumable commodity, devoid of individual stories or even humanity. Curator: Precisely. The composition subtly reinforces power dynamics. The framing isolates the workers in this sea of tea, with the elevated viewpoint symbolizing authority and control over their labor. We aren't seeing this field through their eyes, but rather from the overseer’s position, perpetuating the romanticized notion of plantation life while concealing its inherent oppression. Editor: It's like a visual branding exercise. You see the verdant landscape, almost breathe in the promise of the tea, and miss the back-breaking work that yields such products. We are prompted to think about a good cup of Ceylon tea more than the people in the tea fields, the landscape here is the spectacle. Curator: The photograph exists in this awkward place where natural beauty, and social exploitation intersect and how it was viewed then compared to now shows that no art exists in a vacuum. Editor: Looking at it, you feel a profound disconnect, this kind of exotic pastoral beauty, tinged with something unsettling – a constant reminder of its dark history, a legacy we’re still reckoning with.