Cowichan Girl 1912

Curator: Looking at Edward Curtis's "Cowichan Girl," created in 1912, the first word that pops into my head is 'wistful.' She feels a bit lost in reverie. Editor: What strikes me is the interplay of textures – the ruggedness of the rock formation contrasts sharply with the intricately woven textile that envelops the girl. It invites consideration of how clothing signals social position, and even a sense of value. Curator: I can’t help but wonder what she’s contemplating. There’s a gravity, a certain melancholy, in her averted gaze that speaks volumes, don't you think? Curtis’s work aimed to capture what he perceived as a vanishing way of life, and this image embodies that sentiment so profoundly. It’s not just a portrait; it’s an elegy. Editor: Precisely. Think of the labour involved in crafting that garment, maybe a ceremonial cloak – it tells a whole story of materiality, indigenous technologies, and artistry. And think about Curtis's process as a photographer – what choices was he making about representation, about visibility and erasure? Curator: That’s a fascinating point! It makes me reflect on Curtis's perspective and motivation. While aiming to document a culture, was he also framing it through his own lens, maybe romanticizing it? The softness of pictorialism—the photographic style—adds to that almost dreamlike quality, like something remembered more than witnessed. Editor: Absolutely. And we cannot sidestep the politics embedded in this photographic encounter. How might his external gaze change what she, her clothing, and her land *meant*, both then and for us, now, when we re-consume this image? The original, the print—even the dyes!—would speak volumes. Curator: Indeed. It makes me consider how this image, laden with the weight of history and artistic vision, resonates even now, more than a century later, as a testament to a lived reality, complex and profound. It makes me appreciate both the tangible and intangible forces embedded in her life. Editor: And me, more simply, to consider the very tangible work performed on wool by weavers—ancestral processes embedded with skills, traditions, designs and values… And what Curtis's image leaves out, by simply staging its solitary "vanishing" figure.