J. McGahey, British
Felling Mahogany in Honduras, 1850
Not much is known about artist J. McGahey, other than he was a British printmaker who typically engraved topographical plates of London. This print depicts the direct process of sourcing the mahogany used in colonial furniture making, particularly the human lives that were actually implicated in its collection. While much of the harvesting and trade of mahogany disappeared in the narrative of the works of art it created, this image shows the material from the source, and acknowledges its direct connection to slavery. However, despite that fact that it does not overtly attempt to erase the presence of enslavement in the Caribbean mahogany trade, this print still depicts a very curated image of what is possibly a plantation; the men in the photo seem determined while one of them relaxes on the ground next to the fallen tree, which seems to have had no impact on the surrounding environment, and bear no trace of critique to the labor taking place. Label by Molly McCarthy Flood