We had just departed from the trainstation Liege-guillemins, on itself already an amazin experience due to the fantastic architecture, and the sun was shining at it’s best so also the light was overwelming.We where on our way to Hotton to spend the weekend on a camping, just to get out of our routine’s for a couple days.
Right across the aisle was this young man sitting. It was a well looking young adult male with a dark skin color, biologically speaking. I say it this way because I do not enjoy making racist comments but in this case, the dark color of the skin was of much importance in my decision to take this picture. You see, he was sitting next to the window, with the sun shining right on his face while he and his entire surrounding consisted of dark shades. If not for the world outside the window and the bright colored bottle in front of him, it would almost be a black-white picture. By the sight of this I really wanted to paint this and I started taking pictures, 4 in total.
At first he sat with his eyes closed, later he noticed me taking pictures and even later he looked at me right into the camera. His look was questioning, of course he didn’t understand why I was so boldly taking pictures of him. It was not an angry look, more curious and a little insecure. A couple of my friends would probably refer to this moment as “a very powerful moment”. I said “merci” and a split second later I pushed the button -click- before he could even understand what I was saying. After the picture was taken we looked eachother in the eyes, directly, not thru the camera, and nodded. He smiled, I think he felt safe, he didn’t ask why I took his picture but if he would have gladly told him. Then I didn’t know yet that I would post it online.
The questioning look, the first look you get when you take a picture of somebody for no reason except the present easthetics, I find the most confronting look you can get, touching your pure existential beeïng.