De Middel investigates photography’s ambiguous relationship to truth. Blending documentary and conceptual photographic practices, she plays with reconstructions and archetypes to build a more layered understanding of the subjects she approaches. Working from the premise that mass media is reducing our real understanding of the world we live in, De Middel responds to an urgency to re-imagine tired aesthetic tropes and the insertion of opinion in place of facts.
De Middel’s impulse toward an unconventional angle developed after a 10-year career as a photojournalist. She moved away from straight documentary and produced the acclaimed series, The Afronauts (2012). This explored the history of a failed space program in Zambia in the 1960s through staged re-enactments of obscure narratives, challenging the traditional depiction of the African continent.
Released in 2024, Journey to the Center investigates phenomena related to the migration route through Mexico, with an atmosphere and symbolism inspired by Jules Verne’s famous novel “Journey to the Center of the Earth.”
Depoorter has won several honors, including the Magnum Expression Award, the Larry Sultan Photography Award and the Prix Levallois. In 2023, she was nominated for the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize. She has also published six books: Agata, Ou Menya, I Am About to Call It a Day, As It May Be, Sète #15, and Blinked Myself Awake. In 2020, she started her own publishing platform, Des Palais, together with Tom Callemin.
The relationships Depoorter establishes with the subjects of her photographs lie at the foundation of her artistic practice. Accidental encounters are the starting point. How these interactions naturally develop dictates what follows. Several projects have been the result of Depoorter’s constant questioning of the medium itself.
In her latest book, Blinked Myself Awake, she is shifting her gaze inward. In recent years, photographer Bieke Depoorter has sought out amateur stargazers, visited state-of-the-art observatories, and researched the history of astronomy.
