Anders Kristensson -
"Family and territory"

After many years working with a serie of portraits of the swedish population I wanted to continue with portraits in other countries in Europe. I got a grant from the Hasselblad foundation to spend two month in Grez sur Loing 70 km south of Paris.

I spent a lot of time driving around in the Paris region and started to work in Bellville in the eastern part of Paris. This is a an area with a lot of immigrants from north africa and from the other former french colonies. I started to knock doors to get in touch with people and sometimes I just put up my camera and flash in the street. As I was realy bad in talking french in the beginning it was realy hard to explain what I was doing but as my french improved everything went on easier. As a result of my long presence in the Bellville area I got contact with the local young criminal gang and I was accepted by them which meant they did not rob me.

After the Bellvilleperiod I continued to work in smaller villages south of Paris. Here people were much less suspicious which was the mayor problem in Paris. I visited guipsy camps and found out that the polish guestworkers in sweden are from portugal in france.

There was a hotel in bellville in a very bad shape with thick woodpooles holding up the roof in the corridoors and almost no light. I sneeked in and knocked on some doors to find out who lived here. There were many families living here in a smallsmall rooms, I meet one family from tunisia, they had two small children and just enough space for the matresses on the floor to sleep on. After our conversation I asked if I could make a portrait of them but they did not want to show their disgrace in their present condition. This gave me the idea to call this serie Family and Territory.

 

Throughout the nineties, Anders Kristensson has been absorbed in his "Portraits From an Unpopulated Country", an on-going series of color portraits showing the people who live in Sweden.

Kristensson studied anthropology at the University of Lund 1981-83 and later studied photography at the University of Gothenburg 1987-90. Thanks to the number of grants awarded to him, Kristensson has been able to travel widely in Sweden in order to develop the "Portrait From an Unpopulated Country". These trips, from his home town Malmö in southern Sweden, are usually made in his small car, crammed with photographic equipment, a generator, sleeping bag etc.

In most cases, Kristensson becomes familiar with the people he photographs. He spends time with them to learn more about their way of life. When Kristensson feels they are comfortable, he highlights them against their background. Kristensson is much in demand as an exhibitor. In recent years his busy schedule has included contributions to two group shows at the Museum of Photography in Moderna Museet, Stockholm, and in many other european countries.

Contact: Anders Kristensson,
anders.key@telia.com