Review: Photo book 'Voor altijd Rotterdam'

Sunday 17 November 2019, 20:10 by Erik van Rosmalen | 5,193 views | 0 comments

This article was translated from Dutch with the help of AI. Read the original.

Many tourists, myself included, who spend a day in Rotterdam visit one of those 'hip' places in the modern city. Hotel New York, the Fenix Food Factory. And, of course, the SS Rotterdam, which is now moored at Katendrecht as a hotel, conference centre and attraction.

You almost forget that things once looked very different there. An exhibition and a beautiful photo book by Daniël van de Ven take you back to the romance of Rotterdam in the 1950s and 1960s.

'Voor altijd Rotterdam' is an anthology of Daniël van de Ven's photographic life's work. A true Rotterdammer, he grew up in Delfshaven, where his father, a former sailor, ran his own café.

The young Daniël was already taking photographs during the Second World War. Immediately after the war, he attended the Fotovakschool and began working as a photographer. He did so for 25 years, as a photojournalist and corporate photographer.

A broad view of Rotterdam

This combination resulted in a book offering a broad view of Rotterdam in the decades after the Second World War. It includes a variety of 'loose', spontaneous street scenes, news photographs and reports, as well as meticulously directed, stately advertising photographs for companies, particularly in the port.

And they are all unmistakably Rotterdam.

The result is a beautiful portrait of an era: between 1946 and 1971, Van de Ven watched the city recover through his lens. The city that had been hit so hard during the Second World War.

But he also shows the thousands of Dutch people who sought their fortunes elsewhere in the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s. Our migrants crossing the ocean with their entire families on the ships of the Holland America Line (HAL).

HAL's house photographer

The HAL was therefore Van de Ven's biggest client. What began with a casual 'we sometimes have something to photograph' eventually led to him being at the Wilhelminakade almost every day, working for the HAL.

When the HAL moved its head office to America in the early 1970s, the 'house photographer of the HAL' lost his most important client.

Photography took a back seat to other audiovisual work. The end of 25 years and many tens of thousands of photographs of 'his' city. Van de Ven, born in 1929, still manages those negatives himself.

Photojournalist and corporate photographer

An exhibition and this book have now emerged from that immense archive. Bound in a large format, it presents a beautiful portrait of an era. Excellent journalistic images, featuring celebrities such as Juliana and Churchill.

But he also captured beautiful small moments, such as sleeping dock workers or a girl in a residential area, new-build for the time, taking her cat for a walk on a lead. Van de Ven shows that he had a firm grasp of the various photographic genres.

He worked mostly in black and white, but colour photography is also represented, from the more advertising-focused work Van de Ven did for the HAL. In my view, 'Voor altijd Rotterdam' is highly recommended for any Rotterdam or photography fan.

The exhibition 'Voor altijd Rotterdam' at the Kunsthal, in Rotterdam of course, can be seen until 26 January. The photographer himself tells the stories behind the photographs through audio clips.

The photo book, compiled by author and art historian Sandra van Berkum, is available there, as well as from many online and offline bookshops.

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