Laptele de capră
The Goat Milk
The actual space layout displays a diagonal
composition (engendered by the buildings’ location
related to the pavement and to the street). This
time, the diagonal reverses its movement, running
from right to left. By letting your eye to follow
it, you see that there are two triangles emerging
from the image: an opaque triangle (the building’s
façade is blocking the sight) and another one
marking an open space.
The foreground suggests us a frontal view (the woman
and the herd of goats standing on the narrow alley
and on the footpath), crossing the diagonal’s
movement.
Before reaching the upper left corner, the alley
suddenly turns right, generating a space opening.
That is the very spot where the two human figures
are standing: a haberdasher, a man from Oltenia (we
can identify him by his clothing and by his
accessories- the basket). It seems that he has given
up praising up his merchandise and he stopped to sit
on the curbstone, thus enjoying a spare moment,
without having to pay any attention to the
surroundings. The second human figure is a group of
two persons (two men more precisely), who are
undoubtedly familiar to the place, living in the
neighborhood. The encounter does not seem to be
hazardous, since the two men also enjoy some spare
time that they use by talking one to another. The
two figures exist within this space as instances of
the speech, but also as ‘looking eye’. The two men
seem to get interested in what happens around the
woman; yet, if we follow the sight, the woman’s
space borders on the photographer’s space and
therefore, these eyes located in the middle ground
simultaneously register the action going on in the
image’s foreground (the goats’ milking) and the
photographic act.
While the image’s open space shelters visible human
elements, beyond the façade’s opaqueness, within the
house we can guess the presence of the one who is
actually addressed the act happening in the
foreground. The house is the client’s space. The
difference between the text («The milk is milked in
front of the client. ») and the image (that eludes
such presence) allow temporality to step in. There
are two possible interpretations: the client was
outdoors, at a certain moment and then he got into
the house, maybe just to get the payment ready; or
maybe he is expected to show up, thus keeping his
status of loyal client, since the woman had started
her work without waiting for his presence. There is
an element in the image confirming the first
interpretation: the milk is milked in a glass, which
certainly does not belong to the woman.
The forms of such itinerant trade privilege the
setting up of a personal relationship between the
merchant and the client. The transitory forms
towards organized trade seem to have preserved
something from the logic of such relationship. Even
if the merchandise is traded at the market place, it
acquires the attributes of excellence only when it
is manufactured in front of the client.
