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The most engrossing photographs can often be the ones taken with little consideration of a gallery space or a magazine page. Swedish photographer Märta Thisner’s Drunk in Love — an expansive visual document of her nights out with friends, at bars and parties, that often extend into the early hours of the morning — exemplifies this approach.
Märta grew up on a quiet farm in the Swedish countryside with a big family. As a teenager she longed to leave home and be in nearby Stockholm instead. Inspired by the work of Swedish photographer Lars Tunbjörk and his book Country Beside Itself, which she received aged 14, she would meticulously document life around her on her family’s point-and-shoot, and later began a photography course at school. Now, many years later, she shoots for a number of different brands and publications, and has contributed to many exhibitions in Stockholm; her work gaining international recognition.
This 15-year project came together organically, “I wasn’t really in a hurry, I just wanted it to be something that felt meaningful and fun to do on the side of my assigned work,” Märta says. “Sometimes I shoot a lot, and other periods less… A few years ago I started to feel that it was time to finish it and I started to show some people the material. I have so much material, but my editor and I narrowed it down to 147 pictures. All people that show their face in the book are friends of mine… the book is kind of a family album.”
Full of passionate kisses, hazy neon-lit rooms, naked bodies and slightly perturbed household pets, each image feels like a charming vignette of a different night spent with friends. “Everyone’s favourite picture is of the girls in the window, taken in NYC in 2008,” Märta adds. “Walking by a hotel and looking up I saw them playing around. They’re the only people in the book I don’t know.”
Märta Thisner’s ‘Drunk in Love’ is available to be purchased here.
Credits
Photography Märta Thisner