In Scotland c. 19th century

Curator: Otto Weber's "In Scotland," currently residing at the Harvard Art Museums, presents us with a pastoral scene. Editor: The texture is immediately striking—the long, wiry fur of those Highland cattle practically leaps off the page. Curator: Note how the composition leads the eye. The foreground features these recumbent beasts, and the landscape unfolds in receding planes towards a distant, hazy horizon. Editor: The landscape feels almost like a stage set, doesn’t it? A carefully constructed backdrop for the real subjects: the cattle. I wonder about the agricultural practices implied. Curator: I find the reduction to monochrome profoundly elegant. The values create form and depth through light and shadow, a formal exercise in tonal range. Editor: Yet the choice of subject implies a direct relationship with the land and its resources. The work becomes an index of a specific labor in a certain geography. Curator: Food for thought. Editor: Precisely.