JH Engström
Haunts
HC 25 x 31 cm., o.pp.
Steidl 2006
Brilliant follow-up to "Trying to Dance", which has the crowds, at least our crowds cheering!
"Engström interweaves self-portraits with landscapes, nude portraits of his friends with faded interiors. The result is a dynamic and graphic sequence of images that Engström considers as his reflection of the tensions between loneliness and intimacy, and the disparities between events and elements in his life. The photographs that constitute Trying to Dance were taken in Europe and the USA , predominantly in his native Sweden as well as Brooklyn , New York . Engström moves fluidly between different photographic processes for this highly poetic body of work, developing a sense of the emotional charge of the photographic styles used. His third publication Haunts is due to be published in autumn 2005.
The project continues Engström's use of photography as an autobiographical account and includes photographs made from the late 1990s to the present. Recently Engström has directed a film about his close friendship with the photographer Anders Petersen (which will be shown on Swedish television in autumn 2005) and has had a solo exhibition at the Hasselblad Center in Gothenburg (26 January ? 13 March 2005 ). Engström has received numerous grants and awards and his work is held in collections both in Sweden and abroad. He lives and works in Stockholm. "
- Stefanie Braun, from the Deutsche Börse Photography Prize 2005 Catalogue .