Koreaanse meisjes met David Ketel 1952

This photograph, “Korean Girls with David Ketel,” by David Ketel, captures a moment frozen in time. Look at the way the light falls, as though filtered through a lens of memory. You can almost feel the dust on the ground and imagine the textures of the Hanboks worn by these girls. It's likely that Ketel was thinking about how to represent not just what he saw but how he felt in that moment. There is a directness to the gaze of the two figures, their dresses bold in color, in contrast with the more muted background. He had to choose what to include and what to leave out, what to sharpen and what to blur, just like a painter. It's a reminder that every image is a kind of translation, a way of making sense of the world through feeling and form. And what he made here really resonates.