Zes foto's van een reis door het Midden-Oosten 1927

This page from a photo album holds six small gelatin silver prints, records of a trip through the Middle East by Carolina Onnen. I’m struck by the handwritten captions. They offer a window into the artist’s thinking, acting as a kind of emotional annotation to the images themselves. I imagine Onnen taking the photos, carefully composing each shot, and then later, back home perhaps, arranging them in the album. The act of writing, too, becomes part of the process, layering her memories and impressions onto the visual record. You see, it’s all about the touch, isn't it? The materiality of these photographs – the texture of the paper, the way the light catches the silver, the dark ink of the handwriting. These are not just images; they are traces of a lived experience, a personal journey rendered visible through the act of making. And this is what art can do: give shape to memory, feeling, and experience. We are so lucky to be able to witness her travels through her eye and hand.