Soldaten van het Oregon vrijwilligers regiment tijdens de Filipijns-Amerikaanse Oorlog 1899 - 1913

Here's a vintage photograph of soldiers from the Oregon Volunteer Regiment during the Philippine-American War. Imagine the photographer, setting up their camera in that rice field, probably a bulky piece of equipment for that time. What was it like to experience the war, so far away from home? I imagine, just sitting there, waiting in the heat, it must have been a strange mix of boredom and anxiety. There's an ambiguity to this scene - it's not posed like a formal portrait, but it's not exactly candid either. Is it a staged tableau, a record of a specific moment, or something in between? What’s real, and what's constructed? That in-between space is fertile ground, it makes me think about how we perceive and construct our own histories and narratives today. It feels like the photographer is in conversation with us, across time and place.