Jacob Aue Sobol

Born in 1976 in Copenhagen, Jacob Aue Sobol attended in 1998 the Danish school of documentary and fine arts photography Fatamorgana. There, he developed the photographic language that would dominate his images of Tiniteqilaaq, a camp located on the eastern coast of Greenland that he first visited in the fall of 1999. He spent the following three years in this village, staying at his Greenlandic girlfriend’s house, and living as a fisherman and hunter. Most of his negatives were devoted to capturing the naked body of his muse, snapshot-style, in black and white. 

Years later, the style of Aue Sobol remained unchanged. And, another love story, this time with a woman named Sara, led him to Tokyo, Japan. 

“ I first arrived in Tokyo in the spring of 2006. My friend Sara had found a job there and I decided to accompany her to discover the city where she grew up – a universe entirely new to me, that I knew nothing of and where nothing really attracted me […]. 

The photos from this series represent what I’ve seen and those I spent time with during the following eighteen months. The people that I met there allowed me, I think, to better grasp what it means to be part of today’s Tokyo. Some have become friends; while I only shared a few moments with others. 

My photos are born out of serendipitous encounters, with for only guide my curiosity, my mood of the day and my evolving feelings towards the city as I discovered it. As much as possible, I worked from instinct. Taking photos resembles an improvised game. I feel that the more a photo is spontaneous and unplanned, the more it becomes alive, the more it moves from showing to existing. ” 

Jacob Aue Sobol