Jens Olof Lasthein

Arkhangelsk, Russia (top) & Gurahont, Romania from the book “White Sea Black Sea”

Jens Olof Lasthein (b. 1964, Sweden) lives in Stockholm and is working as a freelance photographer for magazines as well as with self initiated projects.  He graduated from the Nordic  Photography School in 1992. Jens has had about thirty-five solo exhibitions at galleries, museums and festivals in Europe and Asia, and has participated in several group shows. His book Moments in Between (2000), with pictures from the wars in former Yugoslavia, was selected by Martin Parr and Gerry Badger for The Photobook: A History, vol II (2006). The pictures above are from his book White Sea Black Sea (2008).

About the Photographs:

”Since my first travels in Eastern Europe during the early eighties I’ve understood that the feeling of homecoming has nothing to do with one´s geographical origin. During the years 2001-2007 I traveled to areas along the new eastern border of the European Union, from Arkhangelsk on the White Sea to Odessa on the Black Sea photographing the daily life of the people I met. Basically the idea of these pictures is to take the viewer on a visual journey through the borderland between European East and West. Not claiming any kind of truth, the conditions are decided by myself alone, in relation to my own internal boundaries: What is it like being European? An attempt to open up some borders – my own, and maybe even others.”