IJsschotsen in een rivier, Nederland 1910 - 1940

Curator: Brrr, even looking at this photograph gives me the shivers! W. Visser captured "Ice Floes in a River, Netherlands" sometime between 1910 and 1940 using a gelatin silver print. Editor: Cold is right. But I’m seeing a really intriguing landscape...almost abstract. All those broken forms and fractured reflections, it's chaotic and still, all at once. It’s a whole theater of texture—the granular snow and the reflective quality of the ice itself. Curator: Yes, that stillness is striking. I find myself thinking about how these rigid shapes are impermanent, just floating along… They're at the mercy of the current. Do you see how small the figures on the largest ice floe seem, against that somber sky? Editor: The figures? You're right, they seem almost like an afterthought. For me, the material tells a richer story. Gelatin silver prints were a standard of photography at that time, celebrated for their archival quality, which also suggests ideas about industrial progress and labor. These "slices of light" captured by the labor of many... Curator: Precisely, the photographer and then everyone involved in developing, printing. This photograph is not just a depiction, it's a physical object too. Editor: It reminds us that even what seems like a solitary image – a landscape in winter – is embedded in human industry and social exchange. You know, each choice—from gelatin to silver—carries its history and the context in which it was manufactured and valued. Curator: It all really ties back to the sense of melancholy, doesn't it? The beauty and fragility. Looking at the tonality, the infinite range of greys... it is very moving. The monochrome palette highlights these tensions, turning fleeting winterscapes into timeless contemplation on resilience, loss, or quiet persistence. Editor: Absolutely. Next time, I’m wearing gloves! Curator: Perhaps, earmuffs as well.