Carla van de Puttelaar

Carla van de Puttelaar (born 1 November 1967) is a Dutch fine art photographer and art historian.

Van de Puttelaar was born in Zaandam, the Netherlands. She attended the Rietveld Academie in Amsterdam from 1991 to 1996, and received her PhD in art history from Utrecht University in 2017. From 2011 to 2014 she taught at the Royal Academy of Art, The Hague.

Her work in photography specializes in portrait photography, also portraying nudes, while academically she specializes in Dutch and Scottish seventeenth- and early-eighteenth century portraiture. Her book, Scottish Portraiture 1644-1714, was published with Brepols in December 2021.

In 2017, van de Puttelaar started the portrait project Artfully Dressed: Women in the Art World, that consists of over 550 portraits of women in art worldwide, working in different areas of art, representing various ages and cultural backgrounds.

Van de Puttelaar's work has been shown in museums and other venues around the world, and in 2020 she had a retrospective show entitled: Brushed by Light at the National Museum of History and Art in Luxembourg, consisting of 78 works and spanning 22 years. The exhibition was accompanied by a catalog with an introduction by the eminent art historian Rudi Ekkart. In 2021 she collaborated with Iris van Herpen which resulted in the project and exhibition entitled: Synergia.

Van de Puttelaar currently lives and works in Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

Van de Puttelaar’s photography is often compared to that of her contemporaries, such as Rineke Dijkstra and Hellen van Meene, for its echoes of paintings of the Dutch Golden Age. Her images are characterized by a careful balance of composition, light, and texture, reminiscent of the works of that era.

While she began working primarily with film, van de Puttelaar has embraced digital photography in recent years. Many of her works remain untitled, which amplifies a sense of distance and mystery while subtly incorporating elements of intimacy and sensuality.

Van de Puttelaar has won several prizes and awards, including the Dutch Prix de Rome Basic Prize. She gained international recognition following exhibitions in for example New York, Paris and Brussels. Her works have been published as book covers and in magazines like The New Yorker and The New York Times Magazine. In 2009, she ranked 51st in the top 100 of Dutch artists as published by Elseviers Magazine and in 2018, 2019 and 2023, she was a semi-finalist in the Artist of the Year contest of Dutch artists organized by Stichting Kunstweek.

• Carla van de Puttelaar. Tekst/text Rudy Kousbroek (2004) ISBN 90-75574-23-1
• Galateas. With an introduction by Kristien Hemmerechts (2008) ISBN 978-2-930537-01-6
• The Beholder's Eye. Text by Bob Frommé (2008) ISBN 978-90-78909-07-1
• Adornments. Text by Marianne Berardi (2017) ISBN 978-2-87985-641-4
• Artfully Dressed: Women in the Art World. Texts by Marta Weiss, Rachel Kaminsky and Carla van de Puttelaar (2019) ISBN 978-19-126903-98
• Brushed by Light. Text by Rudi Ekkart (2020) ISBN 978-94-90119-56-0
• Synergia / Iris van Herpen, Carla van de Puttelaar. Text by Lisa Small (2021) ISBN 978-90-817026-6-9
• Scottish Portraiture 1644-1714, David and John Scougall and Their Contemporaries. Text by Carla van de Puttelaar (2021) ISBN 978-2-503-59727-0

• Carla van de Puttelaar's official website.
• Website portrait project: Artfully Dressed: Women in the Art World..
• Scottish Portraiture 1644-1714.
• Interview with Carla van de Puttelaar
• (in French) Video Report Carla Van de Puttelaar 'Galateas' 2008 on OC-TV.net