Tijdens de zevendaagse patrouille 1948

This undated photo album page, titled "Tijdens de zevendaagse patrouille," or “During the seven-day patrol,” provides glimpses into the life and activities of the Dutch East Indies Army. The album page, adorned with black and white photographs, offers a series of snapshots that subtly reveal the power dynamics inherent in colonial rule. We see scenes that evoke a constructed, and perhaps manipulated, version of colonial life: soldiers on patrol, landscapes, local life. The images, while seemingly benign, underscore the control and surveillance inherent in the colonial project. What does it mean to be on a seven-day patrol? What does that do to a landscape and its people? These photos are more than just images. They are fragments of a narrative that speaks to identity, power, and the fraught relationship between colonizer and colonized. They invite us to reflect on the gaze through which history is often recorded and remembered.