Untitled (photograph of Bachrach photo of child with doll in doorway) c. 1940

This small black and white photograph shows a child with a doll, standing in a doorway. It was taken by Paul Gittings, who was working from a photograph by Bachrach. I wonder about Gittings in the dark room, what he was thinking as he coaxed this image into being. I see the child – so small – almost swallowed by the hugeness of the architecture. The doll a kind of double, a friend. The light falls from an unseen place, probably outside, and throws the scene into sharp relief. Looking at it now I wonder if the scene is staged – the child asked to stand in this very spot, doll in hand? Or whether it’s simply a captured moment, a fragment of time, preserved forever. A bit like painting, actually. How we try to capture the uncapturable, make something still, something that lasts. It’s like artists are in constant dialogue, reaching back and forward through time and space. I love that.