Tenniswedstrijd 1911 - 1912

Loentje Onnen made this image, Tenniswedstrijd, with photography; it's a series of three black and white photographs arranged on a piece of gray card. There is something very satisfying in the simplicity and directness of the image. The material aspects of this work are interesting: the matte surface of the photographs, the way the light seems to be slightly overexposed, giving everything a kind of dreamy quality. It almost feels like a memory, hazy and a little bit distant. Look at the figure on the right-hand side of the image: there's a real sense of movement, of the body in action, emphasized by the blur. You can see the influence of photography, as the medium became more accessible to amateur artists, or even in the work of someone like Gerhard Richter. Art is always in conversation with itself, playing with ideas, challenging conventions, and refusing to be pinned down.