The photograph shows the Habsburg Archduke Frederick and his family out riding, around 1900, and is one of many hundreds that depict the private and social life of the family that are found in Archduke Frederick's family collection. Although the Archduke's wife, Princess Isabella of Belgium, was herself an enthusiastic amateur photographer, most of the pictures were taken by profes-sionals, most notably Gyula Jelfy, who to all intents and purposes was the household photographer of the Archduke, though he also ran a studio that enjoyed a high reputation in the centre of Budapest. One hundred and fifty photo-graphs from the family collection turned up in Budapest among someone's papers in the seventies to be selected for an album published by Corvina Books under the title Photo Habsburg. It was here I came across the picture of the family out riding.

The picture is above all remarkably beautiful. Its beauty, however, is purely photographic in nature. The way the group is photographed is unusual, and this makes for a unique composition-there is no sky to be seen. The riders and their entourage are on a slope which carries on a little further before rising steeply up a rocky hillside in the background. The camera is looking slightly downwards. As an amateur photographer I know that the brightness of the sky often causes overexposure, and in any case the sky in black-and-white pictures is often just a dead, empty space without colour, tone or texture. For this reason I like landscape or nature photographs in which the black-and-white of the terrestrial objects provides the picture with all its photographic tones. The group of people in the foreground stands out from the background in purely visual terms; in other words irrespective of any thematic emphasis, by the fact that the black-and-white tones are so much sharper, more defined and more alive than the details of the hillside.

This is largely due to the nature of the light and the angle at which it falls on the group, which is also one of the factors which makes this such a fine photograph. The light falls from the left and from behind, so that the picture is almost back-lit. However, this is not strong sunlight, but filtered light. It is as if the sun were shining through a thin haze of cloud; of course we can only feel this, we cannot see it. The clearly defined contours of the forest of horses' legs cast barely discernible, hazy shadows on the grassy ground. I think that it must have been quite daring on the part of the photographer to attempt to take a picture in these lighting conditions, given the technology available and the lighting conventions of the time. If the light had been stronger, then perhaps he would not have taken the picture here or in this way, virtually back-lit.

The filtered light which streams in from outside the picture concentrates especially in the white hats and blouses of the women. The lighting conditions show up with particular effect on women wearing a white hat with a dark blouse. This is even truer for one woman in particular, whom we can see clearly, sitting side-saddle, just right of centre, with the light also picking out strongly the pale-coloured saddle-blanket that can be seen foreshortened in the picture. In general, both in compositional terms and in terms of the definition provided by the lighting conditions, the group in the focal point of the picture lying slightly to the right of centre is presented in a particularly intense and elaborate way. Behind the woman in the white hat slightly to the left of centre, whose horse happens to be turning towards the camera, there are seven horsed figures close behind one another towards the right of the picture; the way they are positioned as regards both depth and breadth produces differences in tone that lend rhythm to the space. I would love to ask the unknown photographer if the groom in the centre foreground is carrying the horse-blanket over his shoulder intentionally so that its folds will be thrown into relief by the light? Whether coincidental or the result of deliberate positioning, the way the central tableau is composed in accordance with the lighting conditions is quite remarkable; this can be seen in the way the legs gain solidity, but it becomes even clearer above waist level: a woman with a white hat and dark blouse; a man with a light jacket and dark hat, sporting a moustache; two women with white hats against the background of a darker-toned parasol, one wearing a white blouse, the other a dark one; in front of these four, who are moving forward in arrow formation, the groom, who was mentioned before; then, behind him, the woman with white ribbons and a white blouse. Towards the right-hand side another two women in white hats, whose two horses, in dynamically divergent positions, hold this duo apart from the others to form a separate unit. This central group of figures, all but one female and on horseback, more or less faces the viewer and is flanked on two sides by male riders standing crosswise.

It must have been difficult to get the group of riders and their attendants into this formation, since all are on horseback, and horses with riders on their backs do not usually stand still. One can see that one or two of them are taking a step or shaking their heads. The riders themselves are all quite composed and disciplined except for the woman with the parasol on the far left of the picture who is opening her mouth as if to call out, and the man just to her left, the Archduke Frederick himself, who is not looking at the camera. The women are all beautiful, well-groomed and attractive. I myself am particularly drawn to the young woman sitting on the bright saddle-blanket. There are surprisingly many of them-seven in all, and the ride has evidently been organized for their pleasure. They would hardly have been out for a gallop dressed like that, with those hats. And in any case, hampers can be seen beside the grooms on the left-hand side, indicating that the company must have stopped somewhere en route for a picnic. The gentlemen are in the minority; there are only four or five of them. It is not clear to me whether the man on the far right is one of the company or one of the servants. With his feathergrass hat, drooping moustache and slightly stocky build, he looks to me like some kind of steward or head groom who was perhaps there to supervise the staff and coordinate the ride. In any event, the fact that he is on horseback could mean that he is not simply one of the ordinary grooms or servants because they- there are five of them-are all standing. We get a glimpse of a small servant-boy, almost completely hidden from view by the man with the blanket, who is standing in front of him.

The fact that the scene, the whole idea of going for a ride on horseback, dates from "peacetime", from before the Great War, naturally makes it a poignant reminder of a past that has long since vanished. Photography seems to be suited for more modern times, and for a different type of image. The aristocratic ritual of riding on horseback is preserved in paintings, etchings and novels. It is particularly perplexing that this picture of the company displays a level of technical accomplishment that would do credit to a modern photograph, in addition to a masterful use of light. One is almost looking at a scene from a modern film, an example of outstanding camerawork. Such elegant, refined ladies in white hats, some of whom were in fact sisters, might recall the three sisters of Bergman's Cries and Whispers. What we have here, however, is not a film, it is a real and authentic image from the lives of royalty at the turn of the century. This picture dates from the same period as other documentary photographs that have turned yellow, or are faded and scratched. A subject matter worthy of the court painter's stylish manner is captured here in all its authenticity.

I can spend ages looking at old group photographs like this. One by one I study the individual people about whom I know nothing other than how they appear at the moment the photograph was taken. I try to imagine what might have happened immediately before and after the photo was taken, on the previous day, that same day and the following day. In the first instance, these faces from the past were not interested in appearing natural-what is natural anyway? Rather, the owner of the face wanted to give an indication of the status he considered he had and enjoyed showing to others. Of course it is difficult to take up such a pose while on horseback. This is another reason why this particular picture is special, because here we have gentlemen and ladies who would otherwise, undoubtedly, have donned the appropriate facial expression and pose in front of the camera, the more or less conventional pose of sitters in a painted portrait. Fully aware of the beauty and elegance of their lifestyle and surrounded by all the trappings that denote the subtle differences in rank, they nevertheless let themselves be glimpsed at in an incidental and improvised moment. And at that moment ultimately all distinctions of rank and status disappear; in the photograph all that remains of everyone is a human face, a fleeting moment in life.