Read more
Le photographe suédois JH Engström poursuit son travail autobiographique à travers l?exploration de son quotidien. Sketch of Paris retrace, en couleur et en noir et blanc, vingt ans de ses séjours dans les mondes interlopes de la ville lumière.
About the author
JH Engström spent the early portion of his life and photography career between Sweden and France. After assisting Mario Testino in Paris and Anders Petersen in Stockholm, he received his formal education from Gothenburg University in Gothenburg, Sweden, graduating in 1997. Engström has produced several photobooks, including Trying to Dance (2004), Haunts (2006), CDG/JHE (2008), From Back Home (with Anders Petersen, 2009) and La Résidence (2009). Engström is the recipient of grants from such institutes as the Swedish Art Council, the Swedish Authors’ Foundation, and the Hasselblad Center. In 2005, he was shortlisted for the Deutsche Börse Photography Prize for his book Trying to Dance. He is represented by Galerie VU, Paris, and by GUN Gallery, Stockholm.
Summary
For more than 20 years, Swedish photographer JH Engström (born 1969) has spent time living and working in Paris, a city that, like New York, has a long photographic pedigree; countless photographers have been inspired by its iconic architecture and busy streets. "Sketch of Paris," however, is hardly a catalog of classic Parisian scenes, offering instead a raw yet lyrical portrayal of the artist's misadventures, loves and random encounters in its streets, bars and artist lofts--an entirely personal Paris. Drawing more from Nan Goldin and Anders Peters than Atget or Henri Cartier-Bresson, Engström brings us on a gritty, no-holds-barred guided tour of life in his adopted city. The book brings together more than 250 color and black-and-white photographs--self-portraits, nudes, portraits of lovers, friends, strangers and the occasional street scene--all shot between 1991 and 2012, tracing a critical time during the development of the artist's own voice and vision.
Additional text
Collected from the bars, streets, and homes Engström frequented, the end result is an intensely intimate, raw, and expressive document and portrait of past loves, adventures, and characters adrift in an ever-shifting cityscape--Colleen Kelsey"Interview" (08/13/2013)
