Groepsportret van een onbekend gezin bestaande uit man, vrouw en twee kinderen, Nederlands-Indië 1900 - 1920

This photograph of a family in the Dutch East Indies was taken by L. Che Lan & Co. Sometime in the last century, we see this group through a sepia filter, a process that feels inherently nostalgic, even if it wasn’t at the time. There’s something about the way the light falls, just so, on their faces, that makes them seem almost luminous. The texture of the print itself is smooth, yet you can almost feel the grit of the process, the layers of emulsion that have settled into this image over time. Look at the little girl on her mother’s lap, perched on the armrest of the chair. The slight blur around her suggests a squirming energy. Her face is full of wonder and a little defiance; she’s the most alive, refusing to be pinned down by the stillness of the moment. It makes me think of other artists who played with these tonal qualities, like Gerhard Richter. Though he was born a generation later, Richter also looked back at the photographic medium as a source to be mined and reimagined. Ultimately, it’s a testament to the medium's endless capacity for reinvention and interpretation.