Plantage-eigenaar met honden op plantage Accaribo te Suriname 1916 - 1930

Theodoor Brouwers made this photograph, 'Plantage-eigenaar met honden op plantage Accaribo te Suriname,' sometime between 1875 and 1932. It’s a small print, so you can see the grain and texture of the paper right away, the process feels close up, like a memory. Look at the way the tones shift; the owner is dressed in light clothes, in contrast with the dark earth. The shadows are deep, especially behind the tree to the left; the shape of the foliage is almost menacing in its density. The way the light catches the dogs feels quite intimate, a moment of everyday life captured in a specific time. Brouwers’s pictures remind me a little of early work by August Sander, who also used photography in a documentary way. In both artists' work, there is the sense of bearing witness, not just to an individual, but to a way of life that is gone. It’s a world that demands we remember, and question, the stories it tells.