David Ketel met de Koreaanse Prins Fridi 1952

David Ketel captured this photo of himself and the Korean Prince Fridi, presumably using a camera sometime during his lifetime. The photograph is very interesting, because it has a lot of foliage going on, from the field of flowers to the forest behind them. There’s a lot of green, white and brown mixing together. The figures are really grounded within the space, the photo captures a real time and place. It's interesting that the artist includes himself in the composition, making this a work about friendship, a meeting of cultures. Ketel and Fridi are really serving. It also feels like this is a kind of artistic exploration, one that you might relate to other artists like Gerhard Richter, who was also engaged in photo based work that explored similar concepts. What I appreciate about this work is that it doesn’t seem to be reaching for some kind of perfect answer, it's more like a glimpse, a moment.