Zeven ronde Kodak-foto's van schaatsers op het Museumplein c. 1891

Hendrik Herman van den Berg captured these seven round Kodak photographs of skaters at Museumplein. Though the exact date is unknown, we might think about how photography in the late 19th and early 20th centuries documented both public and private moments, shaping social memory. Each circular frame becomes a peephole into a past where class distinctions are blurred by a shared activity. The clothing and hats may signal a certain bourgeois class, yet the act of skating— a leisure activity— suggests a temporary suspension of social hierarchies. Consider how the circular format flattens perspective. The skaters are isolated, as though captured in bubbles of time. Van den Berg's framing creates a tension: are these images about the individual or about the collective experience of a community coming together on ice? The emotional resonance for today's viewers lies in their interplay between distance and intimacy. These photographs invite us to reflect on the ephemeral nature of communal joy, and the class and gender dynamics embedded in leisure activities.