Transcending the colonial gaze: Empathy, agency and community in the South Pacific photography of John Watt Beattie1

Q2 Arts and Humanities Journal of New Zealand and Pacific Studies Pub Date : 2020-12-01 DOI:10.1386/nzps_00035_1
T. Brown
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Abstract

For three months in 1906, John Watt Beattie, the noted Australian photographer – at the invitation of the Anglican Bishop of Melanesia, Cecil Wilson – travelling on the church vessel the Southern Cross, photographed people and sites associated with the Melanesian Mission on Norfolk Island and present-day Vanuatu and Solomon Islands. Beattie reproduced many of the 1500-plus photographs from that trip, which he sold in various formats from his photographic studio in Hobart, Tasmania. The photographs constitute a priceless collection of Pacific images that began to be used very quickly in a variety of publications, with or without attribution. I shall examine some of these photographs in the context of the ethos of the Melanesian Mission, British colonialism in the Solomon Islands, and Beattie’s previous photographic experience. I shall argue that Beattie first exhibited a colonial gaze of objectifying his dehumanized exotic subjects (e.g. as ‘savages’ and ‘cannibals’) but with increased familiarity with them, became empathetic and admiring. In this change of attitude, I argue that he effectively transcended his colonial gaze to produce photographs of great empathy, beauty and longevity. At the same time, he became more critical of the colonial enterprise in the Pacific, whether government, commercial or church.
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超越殖民凝视:约翰·瓦特·贝蒂南太平洋摄影中的同情、代理和社区1
1906年,著名的澳大利亚摄影师约翰·瓦特·比蒂(John Watt Beattie)应美拉尼西亚圣公会主教塞西尔·威尔逊(Cecil Wilson)的邀请,花了三个月的时间乘坐教会船只“南十字号”(Southern Cross),在诺福克岛(Norfolk Island)和今天的瓦努阿图(Vanuatu)和所罗门群岛(Solomon Islands)拍摄了与美拉尼西亚传教会有关的人物和地点。比蒂复制了那次旅行中1500多张照片中的许多照片,并在他位于塔斯马尼亚州霍巴特的摄影工作室以各种形式出售。这些照片构成了无价的太平洋图像集,很快就开始在各种出版物中使用,有或没有署名。我将在美拉尼西亚传教会的精神、所罗门群岛的英国殖民主义和贝蒂以前的摄影经历的背景下研究其中的一些照片。我认为,贝蒂首先表现出一种殖民式的凝视,将他的非人性化的异国主题物化(例如,“野蛮人”和“食人族”),但随着对他们的熟悉程度增加,他变得同情和钦佩。在这种态度的转变中,我认为他有效地超越了他的殖民眼光,创作出了具有巨大同情心、美感和长寿的照片。与此同时,他对太平洋地区的殖民企业,无论是政府、商业还是教会,都变得更加批评。
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来源期刊
Journal of New Zealand and Pacific Studies
Journal of New Zealand and Pacific Studies Arts and Humanities-Literature and Literary Theory
CiteScore
0.30
自引率
0.00%
发文量
20
期刊介绍: The Journal of New Zealand & Pacific Studies covers disciplines including the humanities and social sciences, and subjects such as cultural studies, history, literature, film, anthropology, politics and sociology. Each issue of this publication aims to establish a balance between papers on New Zealand and papers on the South Pacific, with a reports and book reviews section included. The journal is sponsored by the New Zealand Studies Association and hosted by the University of Vienna. It has replaced the key publication NZSA Bulletin of New Zealand Studies.
期刊最新文献
In conversation with Stallone Vaiaoga-Ioasa Mothers’ Darlings of The South Pacific: The Children of Indigenous Women and U.S. Servicemen, World War II, Judith A. Bennett and Angela Wanhalla (eds) (2016) Beyond Hawaii: Native Labor in the Pacific World, Gregory Rosenthal (2018) The New Zealand Wars: Ngā Pakanga o Aotearoa, Vincent O’Malley (2019) Special Issue: New Scholarship in New Zealand and Pacific Studies Part 2
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