C-print
147.2 x 123.2 cm


Dutch photographer Rineke Dijkstra’s lauded series “Beach Portraits” (1992–2002) is characteristic of her complex body of photographic and video work. Dubrovnik, Croatia, July 13, 1996, represents just one of the images in this expansive series in which children on beaches in the United States and across Europe were photographed. The resulting works elicit a penetrating psychological response, highlighting the photographer’s compassionate gaze and talent for capturing her subjects during poignant moments of life transition. In the series, the poses are neutral, as is the background, and the subjects are centrally positioned with the sea creating a horizontal line. While this simple visual treatment is objective, her attention to light, facial expression, and posture reveal a subtle vulnerability in her subjects. Dijkstra’s prints are nearly life-sized, bringing to light a gaze that elicits both a feeling of empathy and discomfort in the viewer: adulthood is imminent for these young beach-goers, an oft fraught transition the viewer is more cognizant of than the subject. – Alicia Reuter

 

Rineke Dijkstra (born 2 June 1959) is a Dutch photographer. She lives and works in Amsterdam. Dijkstra has been awarded an Honorary Fellowship of the Royal Photographic Society the 1999 Citibank Private Bank Photography Prize (now Deutsche Börse Photography Prize)  and the 2017 Hasselblad Award.

This biography is from Wikipedia under an Attribution-ShareAlike Creative Commons License.