Gezicht op het Sophiaplein of Muntplein te Amsterdam 1900 - 1917

This photograph of the Sophiaplein or Muntplein in Amsterdam was taken by Cornelis Johannes Steenbergh sometime between the late 19th and early 20th century. I can imagine Steenbergh standing there with his camera, carefully framing the composition. The light is soft and diffused, giving the scene a timeless quality. The buildings are captured in great detail, each window and brick carefully rendered, but it’s really about all the people bustling about their day. Think about what Steenbergh might have been thinking as he captured this scene. Was he trying to document a moment in time? Capture the energy of the city? I like to think he was trying to freeze a little moment of history. Photography is an interesting medium. It is both immediate and it requires time. Steenbergh might have captured the street scene in a fraction of a second, but the image continues to exist, allowing us to see the past and have a sense of the world which he inhabited.