Bertien van Manen - Photographs.

Bertien van Manen (1935–2024) was a Dutch documentary photographer known for her intimate and unpolished style. She began her career in fashion photography before shifting toward documentary work in the late 1970s, inspired by Robert Frank’s The Americans. Her approach emphasised closeness and trust, often using simple cameras to capture moments that resembled family snapshots rather than formal reportage.

Over the course of her career, van Manen worked on long-term projects in regions including the former Soviet Union, China, Appalachia, and Ireland. She immersed herself in the daily lives of the people she photographed, producing work that reflected both personal encounters and wider social conditions. Her method blurred the boundaries between professional documentary and private memory, creating an archive of ordinary experiences across different cultures.

Her photobooks form a central part of her legacy, with titles such as A Hundred Summers, A Hundred Winters (1994), East Wind West Wind (2001), Let’s Sit Down Before We Go (2011), Moonshine (2014), and Beyond Maps and Atlases (2016). Her work has been exhibited internationally, including at MoMA in New York, the Maison Européenne de la Photographie in Paris, and the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam.

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