Fotoreproductie van een gefotografeerd portret van Annie en Lily Holle en Henk van den Berg before 1894

Hendrik Herman van den Berg made this photographic reproduction of a portrait of Annie and Lily Holle and Henk van den Berg, though we don't know exactly when. This image speaks to the rise of photography as a tool for memorializing relationships and cementing social bonds. The subjects' formal attire and stiff poses reflect the conventions of late 19th and early 20th-century portraiture, a period when photography was becoming increasingly accessible to the middle class in countries like the Netherlands. Consider the social dynamics at play here. Are these siblings? A couple and a chaperone? Their relationships are obscured from us but embedded in the cultural norms of that time. The picture itself serves as a social artifact, reflecting the values and aspirations of its subjects. As historians, we look to sources like census records, fashion trends, and photographic archives to reconstruct the world that produced this image. Art, after all, is always shaped by its social context.