The Hunter Hunted, the Collector Collected mirrors the shutter mechanism that captures land as surveyable for imperial exploration. The images are sourced from the records of exploratory missions conducted by Ernst Emil Herzfeld, a German archaeologist who directed the excavation in the area as part of the Persian expedition organized by the Oriental Institute in the early 1930s. According to the records, the aerial photographs were taken from the biplane Friend of Iran, revealing an operative campaigning tactic in the imperial playbook framing archaeological exploration as ostensibly beneficial to the nation, all under the guise of cultural preservation. The works superimpose the reflection of the viewers onto distant landscapes, fragmented by grid coordinate lines of photogrammetric vision. This composition instigates fractured viewing positions of our “here” and “now,” distanced from lands enduring historical trauma. The reflected renditions subvert the extractive depiction of heritage landscapes, where civilization is reduced to a mere reflection of the past.
