Maja Forsslund: AKT

At art school in Paris, Maja Forsslund regularly sketched croquis models for about six years. These croquis sessions are the raw material for painters, teaching them to interpret and shape the human form. Forsslund left Paris and moved to Kraków to continue her studies and she returned to these croquis models, but this time with a camera. The camera adds another dimension. Details stick ruthlessly to the photographs, creating surreal and often tragic portraits. A pair of slippers, a fan and some spots of paint are given an altered meaning. The props turn into the models personal belongings, parts of their universe. A man in the midst of easels and scattered stools is reminiscent of a survivor on a battlefield. Maja Forsslund was born in Stockholm in 1975. She moved to Paris at the age of 19 and stayed there for ten years before graduating from ENSBA, The Academy of Fine Art in Paris in 2003. In 2001/2002 she studied at The Academy of Fine Art in Kraków. Whilst studying she worked as a set designer and mural painter.