A Deserted Oasis 1917 - 1919

Editor: So, this etching by James McBey, "A Deserted Oasis," made between 1917 and 1919... It's quite striking. The landscape feels desolate, but there's also this sense of everyday life continuing amidst the aridity. What stands out to you in this piece? Curator: I see the labor embedded in the very lines of this etching. The choice of etching, a process involving acid to corrode the plate, is significant. The labor and materiality become the message. Note also that the labor performed is also directly tied to the means of sustenance of the people shown. Editor: That's interesting. I was focused on the 'orientalism' style and hadn't really considered the implications of the technique. Are you suggesting that the labor of the etching process itself mirrors the labor depicted in the scene? Curator: Precisely. McBey is not simply depicting a scene, but engaging in a parallel act of production. He is employing labor in Glasgow, but depicts the life in these far away deserts, and how the colonial project exploits cheap foreign labour. What relationship do the workers seem to have to their landscape and material existence? Editor: I see your point. There’s a transactional element. They are existing off the materials provided by the environment, from wells to plants to animals and engaging in work in exchange for sustenance. There's also the element of trade embedded, or at least implied, in a caravan oasis. Curator: Exactly. And the 'deserted' nature... is that natural or is that a direct product of the actions performed upon this natural landscape by colonial intervention and use of it? McBey invites a broader questioning about labor, landscape, and the systems of exchange, of the raw material, images and power themselves. Editor: So, by focusing on the process and materials, we can actually read the social context of the work in a completely different way! Thanks. Curator: Precisely! This perspective has also deepened my engagement with how artistic intention and the politics of materials intertwine.