Eén jaar ben ik! 1939

This is Franz Ziegler’s photograph, ‘Eén jaar ben ik!’, which roughly translates as ‘I am one year old!’. It's a modest work but I think a beautiful one, made with photography, ink and paper. The soft grey of the photograph is set against the darker grey of the album page, and the drawing around the photograph is equally delicate. The caption is written in a careful, calligraphic hand, a tender inscription beneath the image of a happy, gurning baby. I find myself drawn to the bottom right-hand corner of the image. The date, ‘31 Jan ‘39’, is almost obscured by a smudge. I can feel Ziegler’s hand here, the material act of writing and dating the image on this particular day. I think the accidental smudge is beautiful because it makes present the artist’s hand. It reminds me of Karl Blossfeldt's photographs, but with an added layer of personal history. Like Blossfeldt, Ziegler makes the ordinary very special, but the inscription adds something intimate. Art is a conversation, a way of seeing, of thinking, of feeling; an ongoing exchange of ideas across time.