Een ministerieel praatje .... Possibly 1949

This photograph, of what looks like a ministerial chat, was probably made with a large format camera, judging by the depth of field. What's striking is the greyscale of the image, all these men in suits, like a field of dark marks loosely arranged. You can almost feel the flash go off, bleaching the scene, then the gradual return of darkness as the film develops, but never quite. The picture becomes a kind of abstraction, where you’re not really sure what anyone is doing, or why they’re there, only that they’re all together, in a group. Maybe we're not supposed to know what's going on? It feels a bit like a Gerhard Richter painting, one of his blurred photographs, or maybe like a scene out of a film by Bela Tarr. The artist’s hand is not necessarily obvious, but is very present in the way the image is framed, constructed, and presented.