Issue #15, Place Submissions - Camila Svenson

To celebrate Issue #15, Place, we asked photographers about their notion of place and how it has impacted their work physically, mentally, and emotionally. Over the next few weeks until September 18th, we will be posting some of the wonderful responses that we’ve gotten. Stay tuned on our Instagram & Twitter at @museemagazine to see if your work makes the cut.

© Camila Svenson

© Camila Svenson

© Camila Svenson

Artist Statement:

this is a project about teenagers from Húsavik - a little fisherman town in the north of Iceland. At the very end of winter, I was there for a period of two months, and decided that I wanted to get to know them and  document their lives. 

In the first week I was in a pizza party at Ruth's place - the first girl I've photographed. She is taller than me, knows how to bake pizza and always put the receipts on snapchat. I've never felt so nervous. My hands were sweating and my heart pounding. I felt I just moved into a new  school at the middle of the year and someone throwed me in a party where I didn't knew anyone. I asked them stupid questions. I forgot I was there to photograph and just wanted those girls to like me. I forgot they were 16 and I was 26. 

It never gets dark. By 2am a weird tone of blue takes over the sky and it feels like a bad dream.

They all know each other since they were babies. I envy them a little bit; they are less aware of time then me. They think their relationships are infinite and nobody worries about growing up.
I want to photograph that as a part of my life that is missing - this state of being so present with life. To feel a connection with your friends, lovers and to your hometown that is so big you think it will never change. I photograph this girls bedroom and on the white wall she wrote; you will never walk alone. I take a long walk with Birta - one of the girls. We go for an ice cream and I go back to New York in the next day. 

When I am at the airport I get a text message : I already miss you. Maybe I wasn't that invisible.
I try to photograph their lives as if I was creating a memory from my own nostalgia. I feel crazy I no longer remember who I was.

One week after I left, when summer finally arrives, a beautiful boy kills himself. 

It feels weird and I get so mad at him. I've never photographed him, but he was there. He was dancing in the country ball and probably singing to bon jovi with the other kids. 
He will be a boy forever.
I don't understand what went wrong and I wish I could have taken his portrait. It would be a great photograph.

View the artists website below:
http://www.camilasvenson.com