Current Postgraduate Students
Miss Pippa Oldfield
Research Profile
I am undertaking a PhD examining the visibility and agency of women as subjects, producers, consumers, and disseminators of war photography. Questioning the assumption that the genre is a male domain, I aim to offer a re-definition that might more adequately represent women's experiences.
Taking a 'hemispheric' approach, I am examining case studies located within North and Latin America, showing how conventions of war photography and women's roles are played out in dominant culture, and how they are replayed or resisted in Latin America, where political ideologies have arguably led to increased visibility of women in armed conflict. My study is also concerned with the ways in which images travel across geographical borders and time periods, accruing new values and uses that sometimes defy their masculinist origins. Case studies include female participants of the Mexican Revolution; images by US war correspondent Lee Miller for the readership of American Vogue; and the mobilisation of photographs of 'the disappeared' following the Dirty War by Argentinian collective Mothers of Plaza de Mayo.
My research is funded by a Durham Doctoral Fellowship and supervised by the School of Modern Languages and Cultures.
I am a member of Durham Centre for Advanced Photographic Studies (DCAPS) at Durham University; and the Latin American Visual Arts Network (LAVAN), a network organisation for curators run by Visiting Arts. Prior to my PhD, I completed an MA in the Photographic Image at Durham University (2009) and a BA in Fine Art at Falmouth School of Art (1994).
In addition to my research, I am Head of Programme at Impressions Gallery, a public-funded gallery for contemporary photography in Bradford. I have curated numerous exhibitions including Bringing the War Home, a group exhibition of photographic responses to conflict in Afghanistan and Iraq (Impressions Gallery, Bradford, 2010); The Factory of Dreams: Inside Mexico's Soap Operas (Impressions Gallery, York; Globe Gallery, Newcastle; Open Eye Gallery, Liverpool; Instituto de México, Paris; 2005 - 2007); Lee Miller: A Life Less Ordinary (The Photographers' Gallery, London, 2001) and co-curated Once More, With Feeling: Recent Photography From Colombia (Impressions Gallery, Bradford; University of Essex Gallery; The Photographers' Gallery, London; University of Hertfordshire Gallery; Rugby Art Gallery and Museum, 2007 - 2009).
Curatorial projects in development include Adelita and Others, an exhibition and publication examining archive photographs of soldaderas (women participants in the Mexican Revolution) from the Casasola Archive, in collaboration with Dr. Andrea Noble at Durham University.
I have contributed to journals including Portfolio, Bulletin of Hispanic Studies, and Bulletin of Latin American Research, and have edited and provided texts for a number of exhibition catalogues. I have presented papers and given talks at universities and arts organisations including Brunel University; University of Hertfordshire; Swansea Metropolitan University; Sunderland University; Open Eye Gallery, Liverpool; and The Photographers' Gallery, London.