invited guest: Kristoffer Albrecht

Kallerudd, Ingå, Finland, 2005

Bredan, Ingå, Finland, 1999

Aluksne, Latvia, 2004

Kraków, Poland, 2005

Aranda de Duero, Spain, 2006

Nagyatád, Hungary, 2004

On my travels in Europe I have chosen the route more or less haphazardly. I have applied a kind of a methodology of contigencies. Narrow roads have taken me to odd sequestered places, wide main roads to places well-known to every traveller. The scenery has sometimes been overwhelmingly magnificent, sometimes very modest. My impressons have risen a need to share something of them.

I have wished to tell something of what I have come across in remote places, in villages and towns, that are off the main tracks. It's easy to see that the edges of Europe are at least as interesting as its centre. Particularly the Eastern parts of our continent have interested me. In a near future these regions will, no doubt, increasingly resemble the rest of Europe. This means a considerable loss of visual diversity. Photography can preserve something of the appearance of the past. Some of the preserved impressions will perhaps seem peculiar and interesting in the future. I have, nevertheless, not been guided by an explicit aim to document phenomena about to disappear. My photographs are above all the result of a general visual curiosity distinctive to photographers.

Lviv, Ukraine, 2007

Ksar, Bulgaria, 2003

Lviv, Ukraine, 2007

If you wish to communicate something of the circumstances that you run across it's important to retain your visual appetite. Eyes that are unaccustomed to the surrounding visual reality are hungrier. When you get used to circumstances of a location the craving of the eyes becomes numb and it becomes impossible to apprehend details and nuances with the same accuracy and sensitivity. Curiosity drives you further. The vistas change. On my way through the landscapes I've been fascinated by a specific light, by the way the elements in front of me organise themselves in the frame, by people, trees, buildings, animals, clouds, by those things that under lucky circumstances constitute a good picture.

In the autumn of 2008 I 'm publishing a phoobook called Zigzag in Europe, in which these photographs will be included. - Kristoffer Albrecht

Istanbul, Turkey, 1996

Kristoffer Albrecht (b. 1961), works as a researcher at the University of Art and Design in Helsinki. His work has been widely exhibited in Finland and all around the world. These are just a few selected:

2008 Galleri Kronan, Norrköping, Sweden
2007 Candace Dwan Gallery, Katonah, New York, USA
2006 4+ Palais des Académies, Bryssel, Belgium
2000 Galleri Mazarin, Söderhamn, Sweden
1999 Gallery Candace Perich, Katonah, New York, USA
1997 Gallery Kay Kaminski, Lancing, Michigan, USA
1996 Fotogravure - proces - eksperiment, Copenhagen, Denmark
1992 Decennium, Finnish Photographic Art of the 1980's,
Bukarest, Scotland, Istanbul, Ankara, Barcelona, Madrid

Among Albrecht´s published books you will find
2004 Memorabilia
2001 Creative Reproduction (Doctoral Thesis)
1998 Metropol
1994 Fünfundneunzig (group)
1992 Armor
1990 En Avril

His work can be seen in collections at:
Finnish Museum of Photography, Helsinki
Moderna museet, Stockholm
Pushkin Museum, Moscow
Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris
Metropolitain Museum of Art, New York
etc.

invited by ulf fågelhammar
pictures and text © Kristoffer Albrecht