Leiden Repository: https://scholarlypublications.universiteitleiden.nl/handle/1887/4282170

The Situative Portrait - Judith van IJken - doctoral thesis

What do we actually see in a photographic portrait?
 Although portraits are widely understood as constructed rather than truthful representations, this awareness is often suspended in the act of looking. The Situative Portrait begins from the social situation in which a portrait is made – shaped by the photographer, the sitter, and anticipated spectators. Through an interplay of practice and theory, the research proposes the situative portrait: an approach that foregrounds the conditions of making and the network of interactions from which the image emerges. In an age of AI and surveillance, this perspective functions as an exercise in resistance, insisting on critical engagement with photographic images.

Supervisor: Prof. dr. Janneke Wesseling, Prof. dr. Bart Verschaffel (Ghent University)

Co-supervisor: Dr. Florian Cramer

Committee: Zippora Elders (Van Abbemuseum Eindhoven), Prof. dr. Joost Grootens (Royal Danish Academy in Copenhagen), Prof. dr. Erik Viskil, Prof. dr. Vlad Ionescu (Ghent University)

Awarding Institution: Academy of Creative and Performing Arts (ACPA), Leiden University

Date: 2025-11-05

Sponsorship: Stichting de Zaaier