Groepsportret van Eiso en Gerda Bergsma met hun kinderen Georges en Hans in een tuin op Sumatra Possibly 1919

This photo of the Bergsma family, taken in Sumatra, freezes a moment in time. It’s not about the high gloss, but more about the feeling of trying to fix the moment, which is at the heart of artmaking as a process. Look at how the greys bleed into each other. The soft focus almost gives the picture a tangible texture; you can almost feel the humidity in the air. The way the anonymous photographer uses light and shadow creates depth, pulling you into the scene, but the surface of the photo keeps you at arms length. The boy on the right, so formally dressed in his little romper suit, looks apprehensively towards the camera. This expression adds a layer of emotional complexity to the work. It’s this tension between what’s shown and what’s felt that makes photography—like painting—so endlessly fascinating. It reminds me of the work of Lucian Freud, who also captured the weight of human experience in his portraits. Art is, at its heart, about holding onto ambiguity.