Fotoalbum met foto's van het leven van Willem Jacob van den Berg in Zuid-Afrika 1967 - 1971

This is a photograph of an album documenting the life of Willem Jacob van den Berg in South Africa. The most striking symbol, though understated, is the album itself. Consider this book as a ‘memory theater,’ a symbolic repository of lived experience. Albums, like books, have long served as containers of knowledge and memory. This particular album, with its robust, unassuming cover, recalls the Renaissance’s *libri memoriales*, personal notebooks used to record events. These books were not mere diaries but active tools for shaping memory and identity. The act of compiling a photo album, of selecting and arranging images, mirrors the creation of personal mythologies. Each picture, a carefully chosen fragment, contributes to the narrative we construct about ourselves. Like the ancient *mappa mundi*, this album is not a neutral record, but a symbolic map reflecting a journey, a life shaped by time and place. The album is charged with an unspoken emotional weight, engaging viewers on a deep, subconscious level. The tradition of memory-keeping is a cyclical progression, and it resurfaces, evolves, and takes on new meanings in different historical contexts.