Bezoek aan Blijdorp en de bouw van de Moerdijkbrug 1936

Here we have a page from a photo album by Berti Hoppe, with images taken around May and June 1936. The monochrome tones of the photographs create a formal constraint, but what happens within each frame is totally free and open. You get the sense of the artist as curator, carefully placing each image onto the dark page, allowing the story to unfold slowly, and with a quiet sense of rhythm. You might almost think of it as a storyboard, but it feels less like a clear narrative and more like an arrangement of personal memories. The handwritten notes beside each image are really intimate and beautiful, and the whole thing feels like a reminder of the way in which the best art can turn something ephemeral into something permanent. You might think of Gerhard Richter's "Atlas" as a kind of precedent. And like Richter, Hoppe reminds us that art doesn't need to shout to be heard.