Home Studio | Nadja Bournonville
“Intercepted”
“A photographer is also a witness, a spy and a creator of alternative realities. The camera, digital or analog has it’s limits in telling a ‘true’ story but photography has the ability to step in, take the place of memories, overwrite and reshape a series of events. Through photography some things become visible, others disappear. A bit like the secret ink commonly used by spies during the early days of the first world war, treated in the right way it develops completely but looked at with the wrong methods it becomes unreadable and confusing. In the autumn of 2016 I spent ten days in London, searching through the files regarding my great, great aunt Eva de Bournonville at the National Archives in Kew. During the first world war, she played a very small part as one of the most useless spies recruited by the Germans. Eva de Bournonville, a Swedish lady descending from a well known and respected Danish family of ballet choreographers and singers found herself in serious economic trouble at the outbreak of the war. When she was contacted by a Mr. Smith and offered a simple way, without too much effort involved, as he claimed, to get out of debt and earn a lot of money by working for the German Secret Service in London, she accepted. In Kew, everything from letters to trial protocols are kept, although all the facts seemingly lie in those 100 year old files, the true reason for Eva’s crimes still remain blurry. The story of this fortunately misfortunate female spy was the starting point for the intricate web spun by the images in the series ‘Intercepted’; a work that received the Recommend Fellowship selected by Ingo Taubhorn and also resulted in the book „Intercepted“ published by Fotohof in 2018.” —Nadja Bournonville
Right:
“Onus Probandi (Intercepted)”
2018
Edition 2/2 (1AP)
Pigment print, Hahnemüle etching paper
11.8 x 15.75 inches
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Far left:
“It becomes small and insignificant (Intercepted)”
2018
Edition of 2 (1AP)
Pigment print, Hahnemüle Fine Art Baryta
4.3 x 5.9 inches / 11 x 15 cm
Near left:
“Everything here seems to vanish (Intercepted)”
2018
Edition of 2 (1AP)
Pigment print, Hahnemüle Fine Art Baryta
27.5 x 20.5 inches / 70 x 52 cm
Double sided
Framed at 90 degrees from wall
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Far left:
“Phosporus (Intercepted)”
2018
Edition of 2 (1AP)
Hahnemüle Fine Art Baryta
4.3 x 5.9 inches / 11 x 15 cm
Near left:
“Scotophorus (Intercepted)”
2018
Edition of 2 (1AP)
Hahnemüle Fine Art Baryta
27.5 x 20.5 inches / 70 x 52 cm
Double sided
Framed at 90 degrees from wall
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Right: Detail
“Phosporus (Intercepted)”
2018
Edition of 2 (1AP)
Hahnemüle Fine Art Baryta
4.3 x 5.9 inches / 11 x 15 cm
(Verso of double sided diptych)
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Left:
“Empty Agreement (Intercepted)”
2019
Diptych, Unique
23.6 x 35.5 inches
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Left:
“Misleading Information (Intercepted)”
2018
Edition 2/2 (1AP)
Pigment print, Hahnemüle etching paper
15.75 x 19.7 inches
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“When I begin a new series I always need a kind of starting point, which I can then weave an image world around. Sometimes, such as in this work, the project finds its genesis from events within my own family’s history, at other times themes emerge that I wish to try to understand through photography. Louise Bourgeois once remarked that the intensely personal is also the universal and that sentence has always stuck with me.
The invisible ink [Eva] used had long been known to MI5 and they were able to decipher it with relative ease. The traces of her writing clung to her and quickly became her downfall. The invisible ink she used is closely related to an ingredient used to produce the colour ‘Prussian Blue,’ a dark and beautiful tone which is also found in the history of photography in the form of deep blue cyanotypes. Ink that can be used in writing to explain and illuminate can also hide, conceal and confuse. Therefore, ink and the colour blue became recurring elements within the work.
Potassium ferrocyanide is the fundamental ingredient of the invisible ink that Eva wrote her observations with, the molecule is based on the chemical formula of that substance. The sharpness and blurriness of the images is a play on the ink’s function as both visible and invisible. Throughout the history of photography blurry images have played a certain role as evidence, for example from CCTV cameras or in the news media. The lack of sharpness in this case may give the appearance of more authenticity…”
The fact that many of the images are inverted also stems from the idea that they function as proof of something, recalling crime scene photography and the traces of evidence left behind after a crime has been committed. …[I]t becomes like a long line of facts, fragmented sentences, objects and various photographic techniques which become entwined until a type of narrative—which doesn’t necessarily have to be true, perfect or explanatory—arises.
I never feel that I need to reproduce an exact story, one can always relate to and explore the images from different perspectives. For me it is more about the creation of an image and the image itself, to construct a scene, to look at an event and then process it. I have been making photographs since I was fourteen years old, the camera has become a companion and a tool for relating to the outside world, as well as a necessity for both experiencing and locating my place within it.”
Nadja Bournonville was born in Sweden and currently lives and works in Berlin, Germany. Her work has been exhibited at the Goethe-Institut (Washington, DC, Nicosia, Mexico City, and Los Angeles, CA), IMMA (Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin), Eigen+Art Lab (Berlin, Germany), and Pierogi Gallery in New York and Leipzig, Germany. Her works are included in the collections of the Hasselblad Foundation, The National Public Arts Council Sweden, the Maria Bonnier Dahlin Foundation, and numerous private collections.
Left:
“Intercepted” Solo Exhibition
Installation View at Jochen Hempel Gallery
Berlin, 2018
Left:
“Intercepted” Solo Exhibition
Installation View at Jochen Hempel Gallery
Berlin, 2018