Schedel van een beer, en profil before 1869

Curator: It looks as if we're diving straight into the Ice Age, Editor, how does it strike you? Editor: Cold. Utterly cold. And...a little bit sad, to be honest. Something about that vacant eye socket and that kind of…clinical presentation just tugs. Curator: Yes, it is presented quite clinically. We're looking at "Schedel van een beer, en profil," a photograph taken sometime before 1869. It's a gelatin silver print. And the 'Schedel van een beer' translates, of course, from Dutch, to Skull of a Bear. Editor: Right. Not just any bear skull, mind you. 'Ursus spelaeus', as they called it back then... cave bear! Sounds almost mythical, doesn't it? Like something straight out of Tolkien! I find that amazing, what do you see? Curator: That intersection of science and visual culture is fascinating, isn't it? The photographic process itself was still relatively young at the time, imagine what it meant for people to witness for the first time the visual rendering of extinct animals in a photorealistic medium! It gave great prominence and authority to scientific discourses. Editor: You can almost smell the musty shelves of a natural history museum when you gaze at this, right? That specific type of institutional chill? The dark backdrop focuses all attention to the pallid remains and turns it almost…theatrical. I guess it is trying to tell its story. Curator: Precisely. This image speaks to broader 19th-century concerns with the relationship between humankind and nature, also this impulse to categorize and document every corner of the natural world. Editor: Do you know if these images influenced other fields of visual creation, like illustrations or maybe paintings of landscapes? I am just curious if this bear had more creative relatives through time... Curator: Yes, absolutely. These kinds of scientific images were fundamental reference points and impacted naturalist movements across the fine arts and popular media. So even a lonely old bear skull finds itself embedded in much larger visual trends. Editor: It almost makes me want to write a ballad about our lonely "Ursus Spelaeus". There's a certain stark beauty in the remains—an austere poetry—and so much implicit, concealed narrative. What do you think, worth its spot in this show? Curator: Without a doubt, Editor. It gives us pause to consider photography's ability to not just capture reality but also shape it in unexpected and sometimes poignant ways.