Blad 92 uit Stamboek van de leerlingen der Koloniale School voor Meisjes en Vrouwen te 's-Gravenhage deel II (1930-1949) Possibly 1937

This page from the Colonial School for Girls and Women in The Hague, was made in the late 1930s using ink on paper. It’s a kind of painting, really, a constructed surface in layers. I can imagine the hand of the registrar carefully writing in each student's details—address, date of birth, and previous education. The ink varies in darkness, suggesting different pens or refills, moments of pause, or perhaps shifts in mood. Little windows of photographs punctuate the handwritten text, each capturing a student at a particular moment in time. The registrar had to make decisions about how to arrange each image, balancing the formal requirements of record-keeping with an aesthetic consideration for the page’s composition. Just like a painter! The arrangement of the text and images creates a sense of rhythm and balance. This simple document becomes a poignant snapshot of a bygone era, a testament to the shared human experience of learning and growing. We’re all in conversation across time.