Wandelende mensen op straat before 1894

Hendrik Herman van den Berg captured "Wandelende mensen op straat" using photography, a medium that democratized portraiture in ways painting could not. Photography’s rise coincided with significant shifts in class and social dynamics, and here, Van den Berg presents us with a street scene of the leisured class. The figures, formally dressed and strolling, are indicative of a particular societal stratum, one defined by its access to leisure and public space. However, it is equally important to acknowledge who is absent. Where are the working classes? Are their lives absent, or are they deliberately excluded? This image invites us to reflect on the narratives of identity and social hierarchy, especially in terms of who is seen, who is unseen, and who has the agency to represent whom. Van den Berg’s photograph, in its rendering of a specific time and place, challenges us to contemplate the complexities of representation and the subtle ways in which power operates in shaping our visual world.