Artist
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Lars Dyrendom
Lars Dyrendom's artistic practice evolves around photographic archives and collections. A returning theme is how humans as groups behave and act in relation to our surrounding and environment. How we stage and interact with different spaces as well as objects and how we give them emotional, political and ideological meanings in and through photography.
The photographs in an archive or collection often have no beginning or end, but they exist in layers. When moving in-between these layers, norms and structures emerge but also veins of emotion and sudden affects. These aspects co-play and turn “seeing” and ideas of how to see into a complex framework.
"I work project-oriented, and I often use somewhat divergent visual expressions in my work. The common thread is the type of material that usually work with and how I approach it."
The GL/DK project
Today Greenland is a part of The Danish Kingdom after having lifted their colonial status in 1953. They are in many ways not completely detached from the Danish influence and the perspective on their country and its indigens people hasn’t developed into an equal relationship. In 2020 a third of Greenland’s population live and work in Denmark as a marginalized group existing under the weight of the colonial gaze.
I work with an archive based in Denmark, collected by the Danish. In this project I work from my own perspective as a Dane, who has never visited Greenland. My upbringing was influenced by the Danish view of Greenland, throughout school, children’s television, public debates and the use of the Eskimo figure in ice cream vendors in the summer. In this work I question my own view as well as the national gaze towards Greenland and Greenlanders.
We selected five talents based on applications from seven of the Nordic countries and autonomies:
Io Sivertsen (b. 1994, Norway) graduated from The Royal Academy of Art in The Hague, and is attending the Masters programme at the Norwegian Film Academy in Oslo. In her work, she explores the boundary between truth and fiction. Using reality as a starting point, her image-making anchors the subject matter in her own personal perspective.
Depicted themes include climate change, internet culture and sexuality. Nanna Navntoft (b. 1988, based in Denmark) graduated in 2020 from the Danish School of Media and Journalism. As part of her education, she worked at the Danish newspaper Dagbladet Politiken before continuing her studies at The Royal Academy of Art in The Hague. Her work deals with social topics and mental health, which she mainly explores through intimate portraiture.
Essi Maaria Orpana (b. 1988, based in Finland) studied a BA in Visual Arts from Turku University of Applied Science Art Academy as well as Fine Arts at the Universidad Politécnica de Valencia, Spain. In 2021, she will graduate with an MA in Photography at Aalto University, School of Arts. Characteristic to her practice is to perform for, or with, the camera. In this way her artistic approach is personal, flavored with an uncanny twist.
Hrafn Jónsson (Krummi) (b. 1990, based in Iceland) graduated from Ljósmyndaskólinn – The School of Photography, Reykjavik in 2021. Krummi was a teenager when he became disabled. Through his relationship with the photographic medium, he has come to see that whether he is able, less able, more able or disable, he is always, in some way, able. By adhering to the seemingly simple and straightforward medium most of us engage with every day, Krummi is able to push himself forward and engage with his environment.
Lars Dyrendom (b. 1981, based in Sweden) graduated in 2020 from The MFA programme in Photography, Valand Academy University of Gothenburg. His artistic practice revolves around photographic archives and collections. A returning theme in his works is how humans as groups behave and act in relation to their surroundings and environment.
Each of the talents’ works were showcased in tailormade pavilions during CPF in June 2021, designed and built by Bachelor students from the Institute of Architecture and Design, Royal Danish Academy, in dialogue with the five talents. A fruitful and challenging collaboration which sought to merge photography and architecture and play with the perspective.
Copenhagen Photo Festival was launched in 2010 and has become the largest Nordic festival of its kind with exhibitions spread all over galleries, museums and art institutions in Copenhagen and southern Sweden.