Koningin Wilhelmina bij de vaandeluitreiking, gevolgd door militairen, Willemsoord Possibly 1904 - 1914

This little gelatin silver print shows Queen Wilhelmina at a ceremony, followed by soldiers in Willemsoord. It feels like a painting that has only just begun, or maybe one left out in the sun too long. I think about that photographer out there on the day, trying to capture a moment with people and place, light and atmosphere, all at once, and it makes me realize, all art, is just a kind of catching, or grasping, for something, a feeling or a fact. I imagine the gelatin catching the light, and how the weather might have changed the chemical reaction in that moment of exposure. Isn't that what we are all doing all the time, leaving little traces of ourselves as we go? Each artist adds something to the history of art, and each artwork contains countless little decisions that are traces of a life.