Cultuurafdeeling 1931 - 1934

This photograph, "Cultuurafdeeling" by Atelier Kurkdjian shows the workers in a colonial administrative office. It's all sharp edges and long lines, the desks marching into the distance. I wonder what it was like being there, what they were thinking and feeling, stuck in that office. A whole life spent filing and organizing. There’s something so human in that repetition. I can imagine them staring out the window, dreaming of somewhere else. It makes me think of those early photographers. Maybe they were painters at heart, trying to capture the world as they saw it. It reminds me that all art is a conversation. We’re all just riffing off each other, trying to make sense of the world one brushstroke, one snapshot, one keystroke at a time. Every mark is a thought, a feeling, a question. And it’s never really finished, is it?