2025 - Royal Geographical Society, London - Views in the Interior of Guyana

The exhibition, Director's Gallery, Royal Geographical Society, London, includes Gollifer’s artist book in full, a publicly accessible facsimile, six original watercolours, and lithographs that expand on the material inside the book. These are shown alongside three copies of Schomburgk’s original illustrations and a selection of 19th-century expedition tools such as sextants, measuring chains, and compasses. Together, these objects open up conversations about how places have been recorded, interpreted, and claimed, then and now.

“My book Views in the Interior of Guyana, begun in 2012 and completed in 2021, initiates a dialogue with Sir Robert Schomburgk’s Views in the Interior of Guiana, published in 1841. His book documented his first expedition to British Guiana, undertaken for the Royal Geographical Society in London, with the goal of conducting geographical, ethnological, and botanical exploration.

I was born in 1960 in Mabaruma, in the Barima-Waini region—just 20 miles from the “Schomburgk Line,” which today marks the border between Guyana and Venezuela. My project, culminating in this exhibition at the Director’s Gallery, began with a visit to the Schomburgk Archive, housed in the library of the Royal Geographical Society in 2012.

Schomburgk’s Views, an inventory of peoples and places framed by the colonial ideologies of British imperialism, inspired me to create my own version.

Using the genre of topographical watercolour, I sought to echo the visual richness of Schomburgk’s work, translating my paintings into lithographs to produce a limited edition of my own book. Both books are on display in this exhibition, alongside my original paintings.

While Schomburgk’s book reflects the perspectives and values of a colonising power, mine offers a personal narrative of homecoming and serves as a tribute to my Warao-Arawak heritage.”

Ann Gollifer, June 2025

Views in the Interior of Guyana - RGS, framed works

By no means unpleasant

This series By no means unpleasant was inspired by one of the woodcuts I found in the Robert Schomburgk book, Views in the Interior of Guiana 1841. His book contains 12 hand-coloured lithographic plates and numerous monochrome woodcuts scattered throughout the text. In a description of Warao women, he dwells upon their blue facial tattoos and in a typically Victorian compliment, states that he found the overall effectof their appearance, By no means unpleasant. The statement caught my attention as a direct description of my Warao grandmother. It was simultaneously personal, intriguing, dismaying and amusing. It made me think about the social and cultural norms that define particular cultures and how we react to them today and historically. This series is in its infancy and will continue to grow as I work out the questions I wish to ask of Robert Schomburgk and my Grandmother, Marcela Hernandez Valenzuela.