Duitse Reichsarbeitsdienst opgesteld op het Museumplein Possibly 1940 - 1948

Editor: Here we have a gelatin-silver print, possibly taken sometime in the 1940s. It’s titled “Duitse Reichsarbeitsdienst opgesteld op het Museumplein,” and credited to Polygoon. Seeing this line of men, each carrying a shovel, against the backdrop of the Rijksmuseum…it’s unsettling. What’s your take? Curator: The photograph's materiality is key here. Think about what a gelatin-silver print *is*: layers of emulsion, silver halide crystals responding to light, fixed in place. It's a chemical process documenting a very specific moment, but the process itself has social and economic implications. Where did the silver come from? Who produced the chemicals? These materials tell a story. Editor: So you're saying the story isn't just *in* the image, but in the materials it’s made of? Curator: Precisely. The Reichsarbeitsdienst, or RAD, was a labor organization. They were using materials – land, tools – ostensibly for construction and agriculture. This image invites us to question how materials can be mobilized and manipulated for political purposes. Are these tools meant for creation, or a different kind of making? What sort of labor produced these uniforms, shovels and boots? Editor: That shifts my perspective entirely. It's not just about what the RAD *did,* but how the Nazi regime utilized materials and production for its propaganda, control, and ultimately, its destructive aims. I had thought that propaganda usually consists of language, symbols and catchy images, but even this is materialized, too. Curator: Indeed. This piece compels us to confront how even seemingly benign materials can be complicit in larger systems of power and oppression, making visible labor, materiality, and consumption under totalitarian regimes. Editor: I'll definitely be thinking about photography and how it reflects society moving forward.