Groep Jeugdstormers, staand in het gelid, geportretteerd Possibly 1934 - 1935

This small photograph shows a group of Dutch youth, presumably captured with a simple camera. The image is mostly greyscale, which speaks to the time it was taken, but also to the seriousness of the moment. I think about how the photograph is made and preserved - it is a moment captured, a performance staged. The eye is drawn to the sharp dark lines of the ties and socks of the young men, which cut starkly against the lighter shade of their shirts. It makes me think about the work of someone like Gerhard Richter, whose blurred paintings from photographs often deal with history, memory, and the unreliability of images. Like Richter, this image embraces ambiguity. Ultimately, it's a reminder that art, like history, is always open to interpretation.