Fotomontage van 3 vissende mannen in een boot tussen reusachtige vissen 1910

Here's William H. Martin's photo collage of three fishermen in a boat amidst gigantic fish. I am immediately drawn into their watery world, the boat bobbing among these looming creatures. Each fish, a leviathan with gaping jaws and crazed eyes. I wonder about Martin’s process. Did he start with the fishermen and then introduce the surreal scale of the fish? Or did those monstrous forms pre-exist, waiting for human figures to complete their world? Maybe he intended it as a playful commentary on the fisherman’s tale, or a darker one, a nightmare scenario where man is but a tiny plaything in nature's grand theater. I can imagine Martin in his studio, scissors in hand, snipping and pasting, lost in the pleasure of bringing absurdity to life, much like a painter mixes colors to tease out a feeling. He's created a space for us to ponder the oddities of our own existence, to laugh and shiver at the delightful uncertainty of it all. It reminds us that every artist, no matter the medium, is fishing for something elusive: a fleeting moment of truth, beauty, or maybe just a good, unsettling laugh.