Bethlehem, Looking Towards The Dead Sea 1839

David Roberts created this watercolor titled ‘Bethlehem, Looking Towards the Dead Sea’. Roberts, a 19th-century Scottish artist, traveled extensively in the Near East. His work reveals the cultural dynamics of the period, marked by European Orientalism. Bethlehem, revered as the birthplace of Jesus, holds profound religious significance, and you can feel that reverence in the muted colors and the distant point of view. Roberts emphasizes the landscape, yet the town itself is the focal point, evoking a sense of biblical history. The depiction also invokes the power dynamics of colonialism, where the Western gaze frames and interprets the East. While the watercolor might seem like a serene landscape, it is also a product of its time, enmeshed in the complex relationship between the West and the Middle East, of religious devotion, and cultural narratives that continue to shape our understanding of this region.