ILONA LANGBROEK

“Silent Loss” is about Ilona Langbroek’s family history: an unprocessed past where loss plays the leading role – the loss of homeland and identity. It is a poetic series with metaphorical images of memories and fantasies.The stories of her grandparents from the Dutch East Indies have a contradictory character. On the one hand they reflect a mythical country with warmth and beauty; on the other hand there is the unprocessed past of the war and the departure from home. The invisible influences from Indonesia seep through several generations. Four centuries of relations between the Netherlands and the former Dutch East Indies have left their mark.

Ilona Langbroek’s photos exude an atmosphere of nostalgia and sadness, but also of poetry and beauty through which she creates her own story. By using contrast between light and dark, she creates a twilight zone that is a metaphor for remembering and forgetting the past.