An Obscured Man of Nootka Sound

The engravings by John Webber of native peoples encountered on the third and last voyage of Captain Cook are oddly mannered. Webber’s figure drawings were often devoid of any real ethnicity, staunchly rooted in a European classical tradition, and theatrical in their compositions.Native place names were replaced by European names to honour dignitaries back home. This series entitled OBSCURED was inspired by this sense of dislocation and of loss, resulting from the inexorable drive to accumulate new lands and resources, in turn displacing people and obscuring their rich cultures and languages. Preliminary study for Neogeographies https://www.instagram.com/neogeographies/