Kwartier in Buschhoven 1939 - 1940

This set of photographs, titled Kwartier in Buschhoven, are of unknown creation, but were glued into an album. I am really drawn to the way the pictures are cropped, how they focus on the essential forms of the buildings, the soldier, the plane. The grainy texture of the black and white really makes the snow pop. The contrast between the dark buildings and the bright snow gives a stark, graphic quality to the whole scene. I can almost feel the cold, see my breath in the air, hear the crunch of snow underfoot. It's all about capturing a specific moment, a particular place. The whole thing makes me think of Bernd and Hilla Becher, with their typologies of industrial structures, and the way they managed to find the sublime in the mundane. Just like the Bechers, these photos remind us to embrace ambiguity and celebrate the multiple interpretations that art can offer.