Between LightGallery 4 · East Wing01 / 06
Black and white photograph of fishing boats moored in a misty harbour at dawn, a lone figure on the pier.
Black and white photograph of fishing boats moored in a misty harbour at dawn, a lone figure on the pier.

Stop 1 · Audio guide

Harbour at First Light

Elin Varga,

Medium
Gelatin silver print
Dimensions
40 × 50 cm

Guide transcript

Welcome to Between Light. We begin in 1958, on a small harbour on the Baltic coast. Elin Varga rose before dawn for eleven days to make this single frame. Look at how the fog dissolves the horizon, so that sea and sky become one soft grey field. The only sharp edge is the figure on the pier, a fisherman waiting for the tide. Varga worked with a heavy view camera and long exposures, which is why the water appears so still, almost like glass. She once wrote that she was not photographing boats, but the moment just before the day decides what it will be.