Chinese mijnwerkers poserend voor hun verenigingshuis (kongsihuis) te Soengeiliat c. 1900 - 1920

This vintage photograph shows Chinese miners posing in front of their association house in Soengeiliat. It's an anonymous work, so we can only imagine the process involved in capturing the image. The photograph feels grainy, almost like a drawing. The tonal range focuses on subdued greys and browns, creating a sense of distance. It makes me think about the materiality of early photography, how the texture and surface feel like an integral part of the image. I keep coming back to the bottom right corner. There's a tiny white mark there. Maybe it's a scratch, or some kind of printing error. It's like the artist is reminding us that this is a constructed image, not a transparent window onto the world. This photograph reminds me a little of the work of Bernd and Hilla Becher. Both share a similar documentary impulse, but in their typologies of industrial structures, the Bechers somehow managed to imbue these buildings with their own personalities. Here, even though it's a group portrait, the people in it feel somehow more anonymous.