Willem van den Berg met een vrouw en een jongen bij een rivier in Makuleke, Zuid-Afrika 1968

This is Willem van den Berg's photograph of a woman and a boy by a river in Makuleke, South Africa, from who knows when. Looking at these faded blues, browns, and greens, I can imagine van den Berg carefully composing the scene, trying to capture the vastness and light of the South African landscape. I wonder what it was like to be there, what Van den Berg was thinking as he raised his camera to capture the light bouncing off the water. It looks like one of those images that just places you there in a flash. Van den Berg was part of a whole history of landscape painters stretching back to the Dutch Masters and maybe even further. This image is a quiet, almost understated reflection, but reminds us that artists are always in conversation with one another, each adding their voice to the chorus of human expression. These humble, unassuming landscapes can be portals to expansive questions about seeing, thinking, and feeling.