The trail project- chapter I

2021-2022

In a second-hand shop, under a pile of old books hidden away, I found the photo album of Hannie and Billo (1939). The beautiful images of mountains, carefully selected and edited in the album made I knew I had found a treasure. I immediately felt a closeness to these people and recognized the area. For € 7,50 I took them home, and our trip together in the French Alpes started. At first, I didn’t know them that well, but by spending days and nights researching the places they went, I started to get familiar with them and saw how much we had in common. One late night I found out some images were actually postcards as one of the images fell out of the book: Hannie and Billo kept their family in Rotterdam up to date on their journey and send the cards to different addresses close to where I grew up. Stories about scary situations in the mountains, huts they slept in, and very short messages such as ‘Everything ok!’ showed their character and adventures in an even more detailed way.

My family and I have spent many summers hiking in the same region, on the other side of the border (Gran Paradiso, Italy). When I looked back at the images I took all these years, there are many similarities with the images of Hannie and Billo: the focus on the tip of the mountain you’re trying to get closer to, the rivers you encounter, and the first time stepping foot on the snow. We had gone through the same experience, but decades apart. A parallel universe.

Being hermetically involved in this story made me feel like I was with them on this vacation. Mixing their photos with mine creates a new photo album and the story, with the three of us together. Some photos are so similar that they fade the time and borders between us.

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This is just a beginning of a bigger search. I looked for the addresses, names, and family members of Hannie and Billo and found some clues. In the next chapter of this search, I will look for them and go to the exact places they went: part II coming soon