Portret van een onbekende jongen c. 1900 - 1920

This small portrait of an unknown boy was made by Jean Vaessen in an unknown time. The sepia tone gives it a historical feel, like a snapshot from a bygone era. Look at the soft, almost blurry quality. The details aren't super sharp, and that makes me think about the process of photography itself—capturing a moment, but also transforming it. The way the light falls on the boy's face, it’s soft and diffused, almost like a memory. There's something so tender and delicate in how Vaessen captured the boy’s features. I see a hint of what he might become. It’s like looking at a ghost; you can almost feel the weight of time and the unknowable future. It reminds me a little of early portraits by someone like Julia Margaret Cameron, who also used photography to capture something deeply human and fleeting. This feels like an ongoing conversation about time, memory, and what it means to see and be seen.