Isobel Markus-Dunworth

New Portraits

New Portraits is a series of photographs in which the subject (all new mothers) are invited to sit for a portrait in which they are both the subject and the photographer. Behind the camera is a large mirror, against which the subject composes, frames and ultimately photographs themselves.

This series is a response to the 19th century tradition of the “Hidden Mother” portrait, where a caregiver (presumed to be a mother), is quite literally concealed behind and beneath the photographic backdrop as a support and brace for the subject of the photograph, the child. New Portraits seeks to disrupt and destabilise the dynamic of these hidden mother portraits, inviting the mother to move out from behind the backdrop, into visibility and agency.