Rineke Dijkstra

Dutch photographer Rineke Dijkstra first gained international fame in the 1990s with her arresting series of portraits through which she explored the boundaries of the genre. She photographs people – often adolescents – in a sober setting that emphasises their search for identity and self-confidence. Although she sometimes includes their names in the title, her models are always more than merely themselves: they are the individual and the community at the same time. See for example Sasha and Marianna, Kingisepp, A.V. Fomin Botanical Garden, Kiev, Ukraine, May 21 2006 and Sefton Park, Liverpool, June 10, 2006 A.

Her most well-known work is the Beach portraits series, consisting of frontal snapshots of young people taken on beaches in the United States, the Netherlands, Belgium, Poland and Ukraine. Dijkstra captures the vulnerable moment when her subjects adopt or release a pose. Their posture, gaze and body language betray their hesitation and uncertainty. The neutral background, low camera angle and the bright glare of the flash underscore cultural details and lend the figures a monumental presence.

Starting in the mid-90s, Dijkstra also began to focus on more intensely emotional moments. She photographed brand-new mothers with their babies just after birth, without idealising her subjects, and created portraits of bullfighters immediately after leaving the ring, exhausted and scarred. In England, she took portraits of vulnerable secondary-school pupils and girls, all dressed up for a night out. Her direct but respectful approach elevates the personal to a universal level.

Like her photographs, Dijkstra’s video works make use of a static camera position and sober style. See I See a Woman Crying. While the lighting may appear natural, it deviates ever so slightly from reality. The element of time alters the image. The adopted poses gradually soften and the person behind the pose is slowly revealed.