Familie Kessler tijdens een wandeling in het Noorse boslandschap 1909

Geldolph Adriaan Kessler captured his family on camera during a walk in the Norwegian woodlands in this photographic print. I imagine Kessler, adjusting his lens, trying to capture not just the figures of his loved ones, but the very essence of their presence within that landscape. Was he thinking about how the monochrome would flatten the scene, abstracting the hues of green and brown? There's a quiet intimacy to this image, isn't there? It reminds me of early landscape painting, like a Corot, where the figures are secondary to the overall mood. As artists, we’re often trying to freeze time, to hold onto a feeling or a moment that will inevitably slip away. The act of creating becomes a way of preserving not just what we see, but how we experience the world. This photograph connects with a longer history of artists using images of family and landscape as a source of inspiration. Each artist builds upon what came before, contributing to an ongoing conversation about how we see and represent our lives.