This study aims to give an account of the act of posing in photography in terms of the
self/image relationship in order to foreground an unexplored aspect of the pose that is
its potential to question (self-)recognition and/or (self-)identification. By departing
from an analysis of portrait photographs belonging to different cultures and historical
periods, this thesis attempts to provide a critical approach to the act of posing through a
productive communication between visual and theoretical texts and provides a new
approach to the subject/image relationship.
