Nature, folklore and serendipitous photo collaborations

Inspired by Nordic folklore, artists Karoline Hjorth and Riitta Ikonen collaborate with local elders -- farmers, fishermen, cosmologists and more -- to create richly imaginative portraits that explore humanity's connection to nature. Discover their serendipitous artistic practice as they share a selection of fantastical imagery where nature and myth intersect to awaken a sense of wonder.

Riitta Ikonen: Meet our friend Bob.

We met on a wintery night

in the company of the members
of the New York Indoor Gardening Society.

And one of the regulars
was this charismatic gentleman

studying the wonders
of carnivorous plants.

We were there

looking for collaborators
for an art project

looking at modern humans'
belonging to nature.

Karoline Hjorth: We couldn't resist
slipping a little note in Bob's pocket

to say we'd love to hear from him.

And the next day, he called us
and excitedly proclaimed how,

"This is not a time in my life
when I want to lay around in bed."

And the next week,

we were all sitting on a J train
to Forest Park in Queens.

RI: Bob has worked for decades

in New York's fashion
photography industry,

and he had to be replaced by three people

when he eventually chose
to move on to new adventures.

Bob agreed to collaborate with us

on the condition that we wouldn't
mess with the style

that he had taken many decades to perfect.

So we promised to do just that,

and only added a few pine needles.

You might be wondering

why the two of us were trimming
Bob's pine needle beret in the park

in the first place.

We met a few years prior,

when I was investigating on the internet,

looking for a collaborator
for an art project

looking at modern humans'
relationship to nature.

So I do what people do,

I go to Google and I type in three words:

"Norway,"

"grannies" and "photographer."

And I click on the number one
search result,

which was Karoline Hjorth here.

(Laughter)

KH: I had just put out a book
about Norwegian grandmothers.

And initially, we teamed up

to look at how natural phenomena
were explained through human form.

And we started investigating folktales

in a small coastal city in Norway.

RI: We reasoned that the older
the local interviewee,

the closer we would be
to these talking rocks of these stories.

KH: Agnes, for example,
is Norway's oldest parachuting granny.

Her latest jump was at 91.

And this portrait is an homage
to the fabled north wind

often featured in Nordic folk tales.

We met another fabled character
called Lyktemann,

on a bog just outside of Oslo.

Lyktemann's presence as mysterious lights
has been recorded for centuries

in many different cultures
under as many different names,

like Joan the Wad, will-o'-the-wisp

or the man of the lantern.

The contemporary view

or the contemporary
explanation to these lights

is that they are the product
of ignited marsh gas.

The more adventurous view

is that a character appears
when the fog hangs low,

and there are unwary travelers about
who have lost their path.

RI: He is known for being
quite a mischievous character,

never quite revealing the true nature
of his intentions.

KH: And as Bengt is an expert
in astronavigation,

an ex-submarine captain

and the previous chief mate
on board the tall ship Christian Radich,

Bengt was the perfect
personification of Lyktemann.

RI: In our initial quest

of looking into the contemporary
role of folklore,

we were quickly pooh-poohed

for looking into something seen
as childish children's bedtime stories.

Even saying the word "folklore"
got people looking really puzzled.

KH: And it wasn't just the accent.

(Laughter)

RI: We even had an eighth-generation
local potter state

that people from this region

have come up with some
of this nation's best inventions,

and they don't have time to turn rocks
and wonder what is under.

This rejection was exactly what we needed

to keep poking further into this subject.

(Laughter)

KH: We continued to interview people

about their relationship
with their surroundings

and started wondering

what's happening
with people's imagination.

Can our relationship to nature
really be explained so pragmatically,

so entirely boringly,

so that a rock is just
a good old straightforward rock,

and a lake is just a basic wet place,

entirely separate from us?

Can our surroundings really be explained
to such a dull degree of rationality?

RI: The name of our project,
"Eyes as Big as Plates,"

is borrowed from a folk tale.

And there's one with a dog
that's living beneath a bridge

and another version,

where there is a troll
doing the same thing.

And this open-eyed
and potentially risky approach

to seeing the world around you

has become an emblem of the curiosity
that guides our interactions.

KH: Serendipity is our project manager.

And ideally, we meet our collaborators
through random chance.

In the opposite lane in the swimming pool,

at the choir practice,

in a noodle bar

or in a Senegalese fishing harbor,

as you do.

Each image starts with a conversation,

much like a casual interview.

RI: And we never call
these collaborators "models,"

as there are three authors to each image,

all equally crucial
to the realization of their portrait.

There is no age limit,

absolutely anybody
with an interesting lived life

is more than qualified to join.

KH: This is Boubou.

His son-in-law happened to be
in this harbor

when we came looking for locations.

And one impromptu house visit
and fish market shopping spree later,

Boubou and his family
all waded in a low tide with us.

RI: A wearable sculpture is born
from the conversation

with each collaborator

and is made from materials
found in the surroundings.

About one third of Senegal's arable land
is devoted to millet,

an incredibly itchy-to-wear,

nutritious and hardy staple
with deep cultural roots.

This is Mane,

one of the grand grandmothers
of the Ndos village,

a tornado of vigor and energy.

And she applauded to our invitation

to portray her in her personal
favorite crop,

with which she works every day.

KH: It's important
that participation is voluntary.

(Laughter)

If you have doubts in the beginning,

you will definitely regret it

by the time Riitta is stuffing
cold, wet bull kelp up your nose.

(Laughter)

Working with an analog camera
means the process can be slow

and physically challenging.

The person in front of the camera

might be kneeling for three hours
in a freezing sleet,

be bombarded by mosquitoes

or actually, they can also be allergic

to the local flora
they've just been coated in.

RI: And many other things.

(Laughter)

And then, there's,
of course, the elements.

Unpredictability
is one of the main drivers

that keeps this process interesting.

For example, in Iceland,

we were in operation mode,
shooting for two weeks,

without knowing that the camera
was not functioning properly.

Ooh, right?

KH: And because we work
with analog cameras

with actual film rolls,

the excitement
from the shoots keeps giving

until we pick up
the negatives from the lab.

RI: Luckily, Edda, pictured here,

was one of the few that was captured
on film in Iceland.

Pictured here amid bubbling,
steaming hot springs

between two tectonic plates.

Supposedly, there are these little
hot spring birds

that dive into these bubbles,

and according to the legend,

these little birds represent
the souls of the dead.

We have the honor

of working with some of the toughest
and bravest and coolest people around,

and thoroughly enjoy

how some of our works and portraits
stomp on stereotypes about age,

gender and nationality.

KH: To us, much of Western society
is unnecessarily confused

when it comes to the usefulness

of this absolutely
rock-and-roll demographic.

(Laughter)

RI: Attitude, life experience and stamina
are some of the main traits

we have found amongst
all our collaborators,

as well as a formidable curiosity
for new experiences.

KH: We have noticed
how the solitary figures in our images

are increasingly viewed as representations
of the age of loneliness,

known as the Eremocene.

RI: We are trying to encourage

a new way of participating in
and communicating with our surroundings.

KH: There is the assumption

that humans have created
a new geological epoch,

and we need to learn how to see
what our role is in it.

RI: We'll be working with farmers,

cosmologists, geo-ecologists,

ethnomusicologists and marine biologists

to see how art can change
the way we think, act and live.

KH: It's not clear who or what
is the protagonist in our work,

whether it's the human figure
or the nature around them,

and we like it that way.

Ten years and 15 countries
into the project,

we are not sure how, if,
or when this project will end.

RI: We have vowed to continue
as long as it's fun,

and we'll keep making new images
and more books that explore --

KH: How to balance life amongst
the effects of the climate crisis.

The writer Roy Scranton
beautifully summarized

how our project can be approached.

"We need to learn to see,

not just with Western eyes

but with Islamic eyes and Inuit eyes,

not just with human eyes
but with golden-cheeked warbler eyes,

coho salmon eyes

and polar bear eyes,

and not even just with eyes at all,

but with the wild, barely articulate
being of clouds and seas

and seas and rocks and trees and stars."

RI: Perhaps if we start seeing ourselves
through coho salmon eyes,

we might begin to synchronize better
with our fellow flora, fauna and funga.

To do this requires
both imagination and empathy.

And curiosity is at the root of both.

KH: As Halvar, one of our first
collaborators, said nearly 10 years ago,

"If you stop being curious,

you might as well be dead."

(Both) Thank you.

(Laughter)

(Applause)