Kinderen op plantage Accaribo 1913 - 1930

This stereo photograph, made by Theodoor Brouwers, captures children on the Accaribo plantation using a photo-sensitive emulsion on a glass plate. Look closely at the edges of this image; the emulsion is breaking down there, adding a kind of unintentional mark-making. There's a certain directness in the image, a sense of documenting a moment in time. It's all about light and shadow, revealing the texture of the landscape. Notice how the children are caught mid-stride, their figures softly blurred against the backdrop of buildings and trees. The photograph reminds me a little bit of some of the early documentary photography of the American South. People like Walker Evans and Dorothea Lange, who also used photography as a tool to capture the realities of life in a particular time and place. But Brouwers brings a different perspective. And, like those photographers, Brouwers understands the power of art as an ongoing conversation, a dialogue between the past and the present.