A retrospective in The Netherlands will commemorate 40 years of photographic duo Inez & Vinoodh

Inez & Vinoodh, the artistic duo formed by Dutch-born photographers Inez van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin, will mark 40 years of practice in 2026, with fashion as one of their principal arenas of creative exploration. The Kunstmuseum Den Haag (The Hague, Netherlands) is honouring their career with an exhibition titled “Can Love Be a Photograph”, on view from March 21 to September 6.

“Think Love,” 2025 – Inez & Vinoodh

The exhibition spans 18 rooms and, through its curatorial journey, reflects Inez & Vinoodh’s shared life and creative alliance since 1986. The duo were pioneers in the use of digital techniques and technological image manipulation; through their work, the pair have expanded the boundaries of photography as an audiovisual medium.

“Can Love Be a Photograph” charts 40 years of Inez & Vinoodh’s work across art, fashion, and portrait photography. Rather than a chronological arrangement, it is organised thematically. “By eliminating a linear timeline, the images can establish new relationships with one another, underscoring the distinction between time and history. Viewing each image as a form of self-portraiture, Inez & Vinoodh present the exhibition as a testament to love, understood as the act of truly seeing, valuing, and caring for the other,” explains the Kunstmuseum Den Haag in a statement.

Contribution to fashion photography

The exhibition presents key works that illuminate this creative pair’s practice, including the series “Thank You Thighmaster,” “Final Fantasy,” and “The Forest,” as well as “The Kiss,” which the artists regard as the emblem of the exhibition. There will also be a gallery dedicated to their editorial and collage work, with rooms featuring large-format portraits of film stars, artists, musicians, and politicians (from Taylor Swift to Brad Pitt, via Billie Eilish), and areas devoted to their photographs of flowers, closer to portraiture than to still life.

No account of Inez & Vinoodh’s work is complete without their contribution to fashion photography, which is also represented in the exhibition. Over their career, the artists have shot campaigns for brands such as Dior, Gucci, Louis Vuitton, Balenciaga, and Chanel, and have published their photographs in magazines including Vogue, V Magazine, Visionaire, The New York Times Magazine, and W Magazine.

In the words of writer Michael Bracewell, Inez & Vinoodh “manipulate the high-gloss surface of fashion photography into a psychological allegory.” Through its selection and curatorial approach, the retrospective “questions whether glamour truly offers a path to happiness,” according to the museum presenting it.

The exhibition will be accompanied by a catalogue titled “Can Love Be a Photograph- 40 Years of Inez & Vinoodh,” which will include essays by Donatien Grau, Francesco Bonami, Pamela Chen, and Willemijn van der Zwaan, as well as an interview conducted by Tilda Swinton in which the creative duo reflect on their career and recurring themes.

This retrospective follows in the wake of an earlier one dedicated to Inez & Vinoodh in 2010, marking 25 years of the photographers’ collaboration. Titled “Pretty Much Everything 1985–2010,” it premiered in summer 2010 in Amsterdam before travelling to São Paulo, Dallas, and Stockholm.