Canecutter in bedrijf 1938

This photograph, of a cane cutter in operation, was made at an unknown date by an anonymous artist. The monochromatic tones aren’t romantic, it’s a document, almost scientific, but this doesn’t mean it’s without a certain…drama. The photograph seems to me to be about texture: the piled, raw fibres of the sugarcane set against the smooth, cold, hard metal of the cutting machine. Look at the way the sugarcane seems almost to overflow the strict geometry of its container; it’s as if the organic is pushing against the mechanical here. The light gives it a three-dimensional quality; you can imagine reaching out and touching it. This tension reminds me a bit of the still life paintings of Morandi. He, too, took a simple subject and elevated it through close observation and an attention to light and texture. The image is also about a certain way of seeing and understanding the world. There’s an ambiguity to the image that I find fascinating: is it celebrating industrial progress, or critiquing it? I can't quite tell.