Gezicht op steile rotswand van kalksteen ten noorden van Suva before 1899

Curator: There's a strange, alluring beauty to this image. It’s as if a forgotten landscape is calling from some lost age. Editor: This gelatin-silver print by Maximilian Agassiz, taken sometime before 1899, depicts "Gezicht op steile rotswand van kalksteen ten noorden van Suva"—or, a view of steep limestone cliffs north of Suva. What do you make of it? Curator: My first impression? An almost haunted silence. It's all monochrome, like looking through old sepia dreams where all stories were never written, untold secrets hiding in every nook, in every branch and rough limestone scar. Editor: Absolutely. The sharp contrast that emphasizes every crag in the cliffside hints at the violence—geological and otherwise—inherent to this location. We have to remember that colonial photography often exoticized colonized territories like Fiji to normalize European rule. This sublime vision of untouched nature conveniently erases the Indigenous Fijian presence and their complex relationship to this landscape. Curator: It really does give off that 'untouched' vibe. Makes me question, whose idea of beauty are we seeing here? If beauty isn’t for everyone then it loses meaning, or at least gets a weird shadow of cultural bias lurking about in there. But I still see raw emotional charge – you can't manufacture it in photographs, especially not from that time. There's magic happening! Editor: Yes, but that "magic" also serves to distance the viewer. By focusing solely on the visual allure, we risk ignoring the impact of colonialism and capitalism on Fijian lands. We cannot simply appreciate the composition without acknowledging this complex history. Curator: Perhaps art is made beautiful only once you've ripped out the soul of its origin and planted the new, complicated rose of a foreign feeling? Bit sad but perhaps an inescapable consequence of existing and then being *looked* at across time and distance... Editor: Perhaps the beauty lies not in the photograph itself, but in the conversation it sparks. Hopefully, we have created an opportunity to see and interrogate some fresh viewpoints and connections.