Militair voor een deur 1941 - 1945

Here’s a photograph, titled “Militair voor een deur,” made anonymously, of a soldier in a doorway. The grayscale palette and the way the image has been exposed give it a kind of haunted quality. Like something caught between states, a moment in time suspended. Look at the brickwork on the right-hand side, so crisply captured. The detail is remarkable - you can almost feel the texture of the bricks beneath your fingertips. The overall effect is one of stark realism, a kind of documentary approach. And yet, the way the soldier blends into the shadows behind him suggests something more ambiguous, a figure caught in a liminal space. It reminds me a bit of the early work of Gerhard Richter, specifically his use of photography as a basis for painting. Like Richter, the anonymous photographer here seems interested in the way that images can both reveal and conceal, how they can capture a moment in time while also hinting at something beyond. Ultimately, this little picture is about seeing, and the impossibility of fully knowing what we see.