In the broadest terms, Francette Pacteau's research engages with the field of visual representations, especially photography and film. Most recently she has written about violence in relation to the image, considering the terms ‘violence’ and ‘image’ in their various relationships to each other: images of violence, the violence of the image, violence to the image (On not watching Bambi, paper given in the History of Art Department at Bristol University, 2008).