SVEINN FANNAR JOHANSSON
WELDE ARTPRICE - PHOTOGRAPHY
29.05. - 24.07.2005
Young icelandic photographer Sveinn Fannar Johansson (born 1977) created with his seven-part series "Interior of a Rural Home" a cabinet piece in the literally sense. His intimate, clearly restricted work deals with constellations of people in room-interiors. He convinced the jurors of Welde Artprice with technical finesse and an endearing concept. The evidence of his choice was as surprising as the fact that only a few photographers are able to conduct such complex staging in young years.
We are invited visually into an exquisite country house somewhere in Northern Europe. Where exactly it is can not be located because to view outside is interrupted: curtains filter the outside world. The inner world of the scenario gets even more important. A group of young guys acts in front of drapery-covered walls. Their acting seems familiar but a second view reveals that the elements of their doings stay strange. This causes a dreamlike atmosphere in the house. A young woman in a black dress looks at us unemotionally while she is spilling water from a decanter to an antique table. The water is running from the board to the floor to a gray, mysterious conus. Simultaneously a second woman is digging her face into the bolster of a sofa. Behind it three musicians are talking. A young man is eating a banana and appears only as a reflexion in the mirror. Our participation which is intensified by the eye-contact of the main figure emerges as a construct. We are involved into action and even became an active part instead of our wish only to „watch" the image.
The exhibition of "Sveinn Fannar Johannsson" is under patronage of the Olafur Davidsson, the Ambassador of the Republic of Iceland.
The Welde FotoKunstpreis has been announced for the second time in 2005, next will be 2007. The images of the five winners will be printed on each 5000 artlabels which will replace the usual bottle decoration. The five winners and the winner of public choice will be shown at a group show, the first winner by a solo show at ZEPHYR- Raum für Fotografie.