Portret van een staande vrouw in kostuum als koningin, bij de Jubelfeesten van 1890 in Lier 1890

Curator: What strikes me is the regality—almost forced, wouldn’t you say? The posture, the setting…it’s all very deliberate. Editor: Definitely feels posed, almost like a stage play frozen in time. There’s a melancholic grandeur to it, though, isn’t there? All that heavy fabric, the slightly faded opulence…it's beautiful and tragic at the same time. Curator: Exactly. Let’s give our listeners some context. This photograph by Ch. Stalpaert is entitled "Portret van een staande vrouw in kostuum als koningin, bij de Jubelfeesten van 1890 in Lier." Editor: "A portrait of a standing woman dressed as a queen," fancy! The Joyous Celebrations must have been quite something. You know, the texture of the cloak, almost looks like a storm cloud settling around her shoulders, doesn't it? Curator: It is an incredibly dense image when you begin to factor the layers of representation present. You have a woman impersonating royalty for what was, likely, a very constructed national narrative. A moment of deliberately manufactured "joy." Editor: I suppose it shows how obsessed we humans have always been with dressing up, with playing roles. With pretending. Maybe that’s the melancholy I’m sensing—the knowledge that it's all a performance. The contrast with the modern concept of "authenticity" is quite sharp, isn’t it? Curator: Very much so. In the 1890s, photography was increasingly used to not only document reality, but to carefully shape and disseminate cultural values. Consider how portraits such as this, probably reproduced for the press or in personal collections, influenced public imagination and contributed to a certain cult of monarchy, despite being a charade. Editor: The details… those jewels, the crown… they tell such an incomplete story, don't they? I find my mind fills in the gaps, and not always in ways the photographer would have wanted. I wonder what she truly thought of it all, this woman playing queen for a day. Curator: Yes, the staged image, by definition, creates a void for the individual story of the woman and of her perspective on it. Still, it prompts a necessary discussion about the representation of women, class, and power during that era. Editor: You’ve given me so much to ponder. The photo has grown deeper, and that initial feeling is now tinged with… historical awareness! Curator: I hope our listeners feel equally intrigued. Sometimes the art that moves us is precisely the one that also complicates what we think we know.