Goudzoekers 1903 - 1910

Hendrik Doijer made this small photograph, ‘Goudzoekers’ – or ‘Gold Searchers’ – without specifying when. It's like a scene caught between industry and nature, capturing the laborious process of gold mining. The image has this washed-out sepia tone, giving it a ghostly kind of feel. The texture of the earth, the rough-hewn wood of the mining equipment – it’s all so tactile you can almost feel the grit between your fingers. Look at the standing figure on the right, the weight of his body shifted to one leg, gazing off with some kind of fatigue, maybe into a distant future. It's a beautiful moment of stillness. There’s something about the way the light catches the edge of the pit, that reminds me of some of the images made by László Moholy-Nagy. It's this ongoing dialogue artists have, riffing off each other, finding new ways to see the world. This image embraces a complexity of meanings, suggesting we keep questioning the stories we tell ourselves about progress and extraction.