Gezicht op het Badpaviljoen in Domburg c. 1889 - 1900

Curator: Well, here's something to look at: Carl Wilhelm Bauer's "Gezicht op het Badpaviljoen in Domburg," or "View of the Bathing Pavilion in Domburg," circa 1889-1900, currently held at the Rijksmuseum. Editor: Ooh, a ghost pavilion! It feels like a dream, faded and whispery. Look at that spindly tower! Is it just me, or does the whole thing have a slightly melancholy air about it? Curator: Indeed. The photographic print invites close consideration. Note the architectural elements: the precise rendering of the pavilion's structure and that prominent tower which you've already keyed into as well. Consider the materiality: a testament to the technological innovations of the period. Editor: Oh, absolutely! It's more than just a building; it’s a memory of a building, rendered in sepia. The tones are beautiful; so restrained, almost hesitant. I'm picturing ladies in long dresses and gents in boaters enjoying the seaside air. What sort of seaside resort do you suppose this was at the time? Curator: The semiotics of architecture indicate a society embracing leisure. The pavilion becomes a signifier of social status and access to the purportedly salubrious effects of seaside recreation, all encoded in the geometrical precision of its construction and the bourgeois leisure enjoyed by its patrons in period. Editor: Well put, really, and that formal approach reminds me how artificial it all felt, or feels, viewed from our present point in history. Think about it, this imposing structure rising out of what looks to me like rough scrub grass – civilized, cultured leisure imposed on what might have been, or might one day revert to being, rugged coastal terrain. And those two ghostly figures seated on the veranda there-- Curator: It's the compositional balance, certainly, which compels-- Editor: But those figures. They might be us someday, framed in memory, sitting on a terrace as history flows around and, eventually, right through us. Curator: Hmmm. An intriguing phenomenological consideration, I suppose. Well, then. Editor: And one that makes me wonder what sort of ghostly images we're creating, right now, for future viewers.