Blad 52 uit Stamboek van de leerlingen der Koloniale School voor Meisjes en Vrouwen te 's-Gravenhage deel II (1930-1949) Possibly 1933 - 1939

This page from a Colonial School register was made around the 1930s, and is filled with handwriting, signatures, and small photographs. Imagine the anonymous person creating it—they’re recording names, addresses, and destinations, creating a map of lives in transit. I like to think about the repetitive gestures involved, the careful penmanship, and the pasting of the photos. What were they thinking as they meticulously filled each column? Maybe a little bit of boredom. The book has a quality of being a found object, like something Rauschenberg would have used for a collage. It’s like a map, charting the movement and displacement of people across continents. It reminds me that art isn't just what we see on a museum wall. It is a practice of making and recording. The conversations about the state of the world are always around us, and we are the ones making that art.