Far Too Close
www.martinahooglandivanow.com

In Far Too Close, photographer Martina Hoogland Ivanow is playing with the idea of distance in a geographical and emotional sense: distance from the person, the object, the landscape and, fundamentally, from herself as the photographer.

The project explores two seemingly opposite positions of proximity – the experience of closeness and distance. It is an investigation into the relationship between travelling and returning home. Portraits of Martina’s family are mixed with photographs of interiors and landscapes that conjure up the feelings of heritage, social place and background. Together, they underscore the relational and constructive aspects of the family and how we are either identified or alienated within it.

The photographs were taken during a period of seven years, which includes journeys to Siberia, Sakhalin Island, north of Japan, Tierra del Fuego on the southern tip of Argentina and the Kola Peninsula in Russian Lapland. These contested places have been chosen because of their shared dark history and ability to absorb experience of what is unknown or uncomfortable at the ends of the earth.