Ernst van Alphen has been a Professor of Literary Studies at Leiden University since 2000. In his research as well as in his teaching, he is particularly interested in issues that are central in modern and post-modern literature and in the relation between literature and the visual arts. The literary texts and art works on which he focuses are usually part of the movements of the historical avant-gardes, modernism, or postmodernism. For a number of years, van Alphen had a particular interest in literature and art representing the Holocaust, and published several books on this topic. Theoretically, he is interested in problems related to trauma and memory and their role in literary and artistic representation, but no longer only in the context of the Holocaust. A perspective that is usually part of his research is that of gender studies, especially in relation to masculinity. Before Leiden University, he worked at Utrecht University and the University of Nijmegen; at Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen in Rotterdam he held the post of Director of Communication and Education. Ernst van Alphen has also been appointed as Queen Beatrix Professor of Dutch Studies, as well as Professor of Rhetoric at the University of California, Berkeley. His most recent book publications are, Art in Mind: How Contemporary Images Shape Thought (University of Chicago Press 2005), Staging the Archive: Art and Photography in Times of New Media (Reaktion Books 2016), and Failed Images: Photography and its Counter-Practices (Valiz, In press).