Rena 006, 2006

RENA 006 is a series of portraits and landscapes from Rena Leir in Østerdalen, Norway. The camp is the most modern in Europe in terms of architecture and technology. My goal was to get on the inside of the system, to communicate with the human being behind the mask, the person protected by the uniform. The people portrayed are a selected group elite soldiers from The Norwegian Army Special Operations Commando with competence on the highest level within special operations and anti-terror operations. I was admitted into a closed system that very few have access to and where photography is normally strictly prohibited. The soldiers are masked and photographed in uniforms individualized and customized to the different combat situations they are entering; uniforms which almost appear as extensions of their own bodies. It is precisely the relation between what we extract from their politically loaded surface and the subjective content behind which create the tension in this project.

Rena 10, C-print, 2006, 110 x 110 cm

Rena 16, C-print, 2006, 110 x 110 cm

Rena 22, C-print, 2006, 136 x 136 cm

Rena 27, C-print, 2006, 40 x 40 cm