Groepsportret 1900 - 1910

This photograph, titled Groepsportret, was made by C. Kersten & Co., using I'm guessing, some kind of early camera, though I'm not sure when. It's a group portrait, naturally, and the arrangement of the people looks pretty formal, almost like a stage set. Look at the way they hold their tools, stiffly, like props. The high contrast gives the image a stark, almost theatrical quality, highlighting the textures of the clothing and the natural landscape. I keep coming back to the faces, though. They seem a little obscured, flattened, but there's a kind of raw honesty in the way they’re presented. The image reminds me of some of the German photographers like August Sander, who documented different professions and types of people. But this picture seems to embrace a more open-ended, ambiguous meaning, which I like. It leaves you with more questions than answers.