Arbeiders (vooraan Jan Vink) laden een houten vat bij een limonadefabriek c. 1900 - 1910

This small, undated photograph shows workers, perhaps, loading a wooden vat at a lemonade factory. It’s not about perfection, it’s about feeling, right? I imagine the photographer, carefully composing the shot, waiting for just the right light to capture the scene. What were they thinking as they watched those workers go about their day? The tonal range is limited to sepia, which gives the image a nostalgic, almost dreamlike quality. The barrel in the foreground grounds the image in a tactile reality. You can almost feel the weight and texture of the wood. It is this kind of texture and surface that gives me the shivers. It's a conversation across time, between the photographer and the viewer, about labor, about industry, and about the simple, everyday moments that make up a life. There’s a beauty here that’s hard to put into words.