The Afterlife of a Forgotten Archive: Artist Sophie Thun Interprets the Photographic Legacy of Zenta Dzividzinska
Presentation Type
Presentation
Start Date
8-3-2025 10:00 PM
Description
Dr. Alise Tifentale, Art and Photography Historian and Curator/ City University of New York - Kingsborough, New York City, U.S.A.
The Afterlife of a Forgotten Archive: Artist Sophie Thun Interprets the Photographic Legacy of Zenta Dzividzinska
Zenta Dzividzinska (1944-2011), a Latvian artist, developed a distinctive photographic practice in the 1960s and early 1970s, investigating methods to capture a woman’s experience. She worked across genres, styles, and techniques ranging from documentary approach to abstraction and photomontage, from spontaneous self-portraits to elaborately staged setups with female friends as models. Unfortunately, most of her work was not published or exhibited during her lifetime. Only a decade after Dzividzinska’s untimely death in 2011, her legacy emerged from obscurity and began to receive international attention.
In 2021, Dzividzinska’s photographic archive became a focal point of the solo show of Austrian contemporary artist Sophie Thun (b. 1985), curated by Zane Onckule and titled “I Don’t Remember a Thing: Entering the Elusive Estate of ZDZ” (Kim? Contemporary Art Center, Riga, Latvia, July 15—September 12, 2021).
In addition to exhibiting her own photographs, Thun used the duration of the show to study Dzividzinska’s archive and to print new images from Dzividzinska’s negatives in a temporary darkroom that she had installed in one of the gallery’s rooms. Onckule invited another collaborator, art historian and librarian Līga Goldberga, who, alongside Thun, worked as an archivist. In front of the spectators, Goldberga opened the boxes where Dzividzinska had kept her negatives, prints, and papers, listed their contents, and helped Thun with the selection of negatives.
The new prints that gradually filled the gallery walls were recognizably Thun’s, while they also highlighted recurring themes in Dzividzinska’s oeuvre, such as the introspective self-portrait. Thun refers to her method as “interpreting” Dzividzinska’s work. Thun’s interpretations spark a discussion of authorship and agency as well as care and collaboration. Meanwhile, exposing the darkroom process and publicly conducting research in a previously unexamined private archive speak of the historical invisibility of many female photographers’ labor.
Alise Tifentale, Ph.D., is an art and photography historian. She is the author of books ""The Photograph as Art in Latvia, 1960-1969"" (2011) and ""Photographer Alnis Stakle"" (2009). Her forthcoming book, ""Photo Club Culture: Global Image Circulation, Competition, and Collaboration in the 1950s and 1960s,"" examines the interconnected system of photo clubs emerging across the decolonizing world after the end of the Second World War. Her articles have appeared in ARTMargins, CAA.Reviews, MoMA Post, Networking Knowledge, PhotoResearcher, and other journals, and she has contributed chapters to ""Routledge Companion to Photography and Visual Culture"" (2018), ""Exploring the Selfie: Historical, Analytical, and Theoretical Approaches to Digital Self-Photography"" (2018), and other volumes. Tifentale received her Ph.D. in art history from the Graduate Center, CUNY, and teaches the history of art and photography at CUNY Kingsborough, Queensborough, and SUNY Old Westbury. She is the curator of the archive of photographer Zenta Dzividzinska.
Relational Format
Conference proceeding
Recommended Citation
Tifentale, Alise, "The Afterlife of a Forgotten Archive: Artist Sophie Thun Interprets the Photographic Legacy of Zenta Dzividzinska" (2025). Women of Photography: A 24-Hour Conference-a-thon Celebrating International Women’s Day 2025. 63.
https://egrove.olemiss.edu/womenofphotography/2025/schedule/63
The Afterlife of a Forgotten Archive: Artist Sophie Thun Interprets the Photographic Legacy of Zenta Dzividzinska
Dr. Alise Tifentale, Art and Photography Historian and Curator/ City University of New York - Kingsborough, New York City, U.S.A.
The Afterlife of a Forgotten Archive: Artist Sophie Thun Interprets the Photographic Legacy of Zenta Dzividzinska
Zenta Dzividzinska (1944-2011), a Latvian artist, developed a distinctive photographic practice in the 1960s and early 1970s, investigating methods to capture a woman’s experience. She worked across genres, styles, and techniques ranging from documentary approach to abstraction and photomontage, from spontaneous self-portraits to elaborately staged setups with female friends as models. Unfortunately, most of her work was not published or exhibited during her lifetime. Only a decade after Dzividzinska’s untimely death in 2011, her legacy emerged from obscurity and began to receive international attention.
In 2021, Dzividzinska’s photographic archive became a focal point of the solo show of Austrian contemporary artist Sophie Thun (b. 1985), curated by Zane Onckule and titled “I Don’t Remember a Thing: Entering the Elusive Estate of ZDZ” (Kim? Contemporary Art Center, Riga, Latvia, July 15—September 12, 2021).
In addition to exhibiting her own photographs, Thun used the duration of the show to study Dzividzinska’s archive and to print new images from Dzividzinska’s negatives in a temporary darkroom that she had installed in one of the gallery’s rooms. Onckule invited another collaborator, art historian and librarian Līga Goldberga, who, alongside Thun, worked as an archivist. In front of the spectators, Goldberga opened the boxes where Dzividzinska had kept her negatives, prints, and papers, listed their contents, and helped Thun with the selection of negatives.
The new prints that gradually filled the gallery walls were recognizably Thun’s, while they also highlighted recurring themes in Dzividzinska’s oeuvre, such as the introspective self-portrait. Thun refers to her method as “interpreting” Dzividzinska’s work. Thun’s interpretations spark a discussion of authorship and agency as well as care and collaboration. Meanwhile, exposing the darkroom process and publicly conducting research in a previously unexamined private archive speak of the historical invisibility of many female photographers’ labor.
Alise Tifentale, Ph.D., is an art and photography historian. She is the author of books ""The Photograph as Art in Latvia, 1960-1969"" (2011) and ""Photographer Alnis Stakle"" (2009). Her forthcoming book, ""Photo Club Culture: Global Image Circulation, Competition, and Collaboration in the 1950s and 1960s,"" examines the interconnected system of photo clubs emerging across the decolonizing world after the end of the Second World War. Her articles have appeared in ARTMargins, CAA.Reviews, MoMA Post, Networking Knowledge, PhotoResearcher, and other journals, and she has contributed chapters to ""Routledge Companion to Photography and Visual Culture"" (2018), ""Exploring the Selfie: Historical, Analytical, and Theoretical Approaches to Digital Self-Photography"" (2018), and other volumes. Tifentale received her Ph.D. in art history from the Graduate Center, CUNY, and teaches the history of art and photography at CUNY Kingsborough, Queensborough, and SUNY Old Westbury. She is the curator of the archive of photographer Zenta Dzividzinska.
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