Militair met familie 1941 - 1942

This is a page from an old photo album featuring a military man and his family by an anonymous photographer. I’m drawn to the arrangement, the way the snapshots are slightly askew on the page, and how the corners of the photographs curl, giving a sense of time passing. The album page acts as a kind of backdrop, a muted canvas onto which these moments are placed. Each photo is like a little world. I keep coming back to the topmost image of the soldier standing with one hand on his hip – he's staring off into the distance, looking rather dashing. The tones are soft, and there’s a blur to the image that makes me think of half-remembered dreams. The softness, the faded quality of the images, and the casual placement evoke a sense of intimacy and nostalgia. It's a bit like Gerhard Richter’s blurred paintings, where the indistinctness creates a distance but also an intense emotional connection. It reminds us that art is an ongoing conversation, a continuous loop of inspiration and reinterpretation.