The Body of Ambivalence: The ‘Alive, Yet Dead’ Portrait in the Nineteenth Century

This paper is particularly concerned with ‘alive, yet dead’ portraits in the nineteenth century and how these images can invite specific readings. Extraordinary about this type of portrait photography is that it shows the dead sitter as a living person. The evidence of deadly signs on the body is hidden in a body of ambivalence–a body which fluctuates between a status of life and death. By examining particular cases of ‘alive, yet dead’ portraits, this paper will analyse aspects of temporal arrangements, visible and invisible signs in the image and how the bodies of evidence and ambivalence are constructed.