Kontinent Photographer Anders Hansson was awarded Photographer of the year at the Swedish Picture of the Year award in Jönköping, Sweden, on Saturday. Kontinent CEO Magnus Laupa called him up for an interview:
ML
Congratulations on your recent success at Picture of the Year Awards Sweden 2016.
Winning four awards including the most prestigious one of them all, ‘Sweden’s Photographer of the Year’, is a real confirmation of just how good your work is.
AH
Thank you, yes, winning ‘Sweden’s Photographer of the Year Award’ came as a great surprise to me. Particularly if you consider the incredible work of Magnus Wennman.
I think it must have been as a result of the fact that this year I covered many of the major news stories. It’s amazing, Swedish Radio just called me and wanted to interview me for P4. It all feels a bit unreal.
ML
Do you think that the recognition that comes as a result of winning this award will affect the way in which you work as a freelance photographer?
AH
No,I don’t think so. It’s probably positive if you are a photographer for an established newspaper such as Dagens Nyheter (DN). However, previously it has actually not necessarily helped freelancers. In fact, some have lost work as commissioning editors have tended to regard them almost as ‘overqualified’ for assignments that they might ordinarily have given them.
ML
Let’s consider 2015, which was a very busy year for you. You have covered the refugee situation for quite some time. Could you tell us something about your award winning body of work?
Let’s start with an iconic image from 2015, the picture that depicts a young boy sitting atop a man’s shoulders.
AH
In 2015 more than one million refugees fled to Europe. North Eastern Lesbos is one of the most dangerous landing points for refugees arriving by boat. That day, in the beginning of November, I went out with some Norwegian volunteers, who’d seized a boat from smugglers which they were going to use to help refugees in distress. We went out in the boat to a risky area where few volunteers work. We’d just come in behind a boat of refugees when boat after boat began to arrive. We carried children ashore, everything was soaked, there was water everywhere. When they came ashore many lit fires to dry their clothes. That’s the fire in the background– a fire to dry the clothes.
ML
Please tell us about the image of the children wrapped in thermal blankets.
AH
In the days previous to this photograph, few boats had arrived owing to poor weather conditions. But on the 3rd of November, 7 000 people came to Lesbos, Greece. I photographed one of the last boats to arrive that day. In this picture, you can see the volunteers, wearing headlamps, wrapping the cold, panic-stricken children, in blankets.
ML
When taking pictures in chaotic situations such as these, what do you feel?
AH
Generally one doesn’t have the time to reflect in the moment, you are so focused on the subject and trying to capture it in as intelligible a way as possible. You cannot reflect deeply on the immediate situation at the time. That comes later.
ML
Have you thought much about your work this year? Do memories associated with the images come back to you?
AH
To some extent, not least because I haven’t stopped working with this project [Flykt]. It’s a work in progress and the existing exhibition is constantly updated with new images. I think that over the years I have learned to cope. When I get home to my family, I don’t have time to sit around deep in thought with the kids running about. I’m not particularly brooding by nature. However, memories from photographs do come back.
ML
I understand that Don McCullin is one of your role models. Given that many believe McCullin withdrew from ‘civilisation’, traumatized after years of reporting from the frontline. Has your view of humankind also changed?
AH
Yes, it has but I don’t feel traumatized that way. McCullin witnessed some of the most harrowing humanitarian disasters of the last century. He worked in the most extreme of situations often in conflict zones. My work is mostly concerning the consequences of conflict. I have seen what humankind is capable of and that our idea of ‘civilization’ ultimately is only “…a thin layer of ice”. Yes, that realization has come.
Somewhere along the way, I became a lot less idealistic because one realizes how damn complex everything is. However, I am still an idealist in some areas. The strength that the vulnerable show gives us hope. Just last week at the border between Greece and Macedonia, I arrived at a refugee tent and they offered me the little they had. It is extraordinary to witness people’s immense strength in the face of such adversity. Evil doesn’t surprise me anymore because it appears everywhere. Every now and then, people’s immense goodness shines through.
Evil doesn’t surprise me anymore because it appears everywhere. Every now and then, people’s immense goodness shines through.
ML
Tell us about the Paris photo that won in the category News Image Abroad 2016.
AH
It was several days after the the November 2015 Paris attacks.
My reporter and I were about to have dinner and thousands were gathering nearby at the Place de la République in a show of solidarity. Suddenly, people began running into the restaurant, shouting “they’re shooting, they’re shooting!”. This picture is the one clear exposure of three, which I took of a woman panic-stricken huddled on the floor. It truly expresses, I feel, the state of fear and panic which Paris finds itself in. I have never experienced anything like it.
ML
It is interesting; you work within a wide spectrum. Could you tell us a little of your picture of Lars Vilks and how you arrived at this portrait?
AH
The portrait feels very symbolic of Vilks situation and I wanted to capture that. Vilks is an interesting phenomena as he is completely excluded from participating in Swedish cultural debate. Regardless of what one thinks of him, I think it is odd that we are not more concerned or protective of our freedom of speech. This image was taken the first time my reporter (Niklas) and I met him, and he was playing football with his childhood friends. Vilks is very well guarded and it is difficult to get access to him. During the match, he decided that he wanted to go for a swim. I knew that a picture of Vilks secluded in the ocean would be the portrait that I wanted. So we went with him and fortunately discovered that the beach was more or less deserted.
ML
How was it to cover so many international events when so much was happening in your home town of Malmö?
AH
It was difficult as [in Malmö] so much was happening and I really wanted to document it. But in Sweden so much happens behind closed doors. Permission is needed for everything. On the one hand everyone is worried about protecting the refugees from journalists (and others) and on the other hand we are being told by the refugees that they want their stories to be told. This makes it extremely difficult to go any deeper.
ML
Please tell us about your image that won in the category News Image Sweden 2016.
AH
This photo was taken at the train station the day that Sweden introduced border controls to stop the flow of refugees. It was difficult to do anything that made any sense of the situation. We didn’t want to go onto the trains and take pictures of people’s faces, which we knew would be intimidating. We focused on the police and followed them around. I finally managed to capture an image, which by its’ multilayered nature, I believe, conveys the confusion felt by the refugees.
See the full list of winners at Årets Bild (in Swedish). The winning images are exhibited at Jönköpings Länsmuseum and at Galleri Kontrast in Stockholm (opens saturday the 12th).
Anders Hansson started out as a full time photograper in 1998 after studying Sociology and languages in addition to working as a journalist during the 90’s. Since 2000 he has been covering social issues around the world. From Kongo and Benin in Africa to Svalbard in the Arctic north – always with the common man in focus.
His work has been published in most key Scandinavian newspapers and magazines, such as Politiken(DK), Berlingske(DK), Aftenposten(NO), Suomen Kuvalehti(FI), Hufvudstadsbladet(FI), DN(SE), SVD(SE), Aftonbladet(SE), Ordfront(SE), ETC(SE), Focus(SE) among others.