Gezicht op de ruïne van een Romeins amfitheater in Timgad before 1894

This photograph presents a distant view of the ruins of a Roman amphitheater in Timgad. The use of black and white, coupled with the fragmented state of the architecture, evokes a feeling of melancholic grandeur. The composition hinges on a play of light and shadow that highlights the theater's crumbling structure. The arrangement of the ruins is not random; the photograph appears to capture a carefully chosen angle that emphasizes the scale of the ruins. Viewed through a structuralist lens, the amphitheater becomes a signifier of Roman power and civilization, now eroded and destabilized. It challenges the idea of fixed meanings, suggesting that the values and categories associated with historical power are subject to decay and reinterpretation. The ruins invite us to question how societies construct, maintain, and eventually lose their dominance.