Gezicht op een huis en het water van Gunung Sahari in Batavia c. 1890 - 1910

Editor: This is an albumen print from between 1890 and 1910, "Gezicht op een huis en het water van Gunung Sahari in Batavia" by Otto Hisgen. The sepia tones give it an antique feel, but it's really the composition—the canal dividing the scene, the solitary figure—that draws me in. What strikes you most about this photograph? Curator: Well, focusing on its materiality reveals a lot. The albumen print process itself is fascinating—coating paper with egg whites and silver nitrate, exposing it to light… Laborious! This immediately highlights the human involvement, the labor, that often gets overlooked in these seemingly straightforward landscapes. Editor: Human involvement beyond the composition, you mean? Curator: Exactly. Look at the context. "Batavia" is colonial Jakarta. So, while the photograph seems to depict a tranquil scene, it’s born from a history of exploitation. Who had the means to commission or produce these images? Who benefitted from the depiction of this "tranquility?" Was it the Dutch colonizers, or was it for Indonesian distribution? Editor: That’s a good point, the labor and the resources involved were certainly not distributed equally. I guess I was viewing it with twenty-first century eyes, but the photograph itself becomes a product of that unequal system. Curator: Precisely. The very act of creating and consuming such images becomes a form of cultural and economic exchange. The materiality is linked to power, isn't it? We should consider whose narrative this image supports. Editor: I never thought of it that way, but understanding the material creation of this image completely shifts my perspective. It is no longer just a pretty picture, it's a cultural artifact with a history of labor. Curator: And questioning who benefits helps unlock that history.