Swedish-born photographer
Christer, AKA
Christer Rosewell, specializes in
fine art and
erotic images, exploring the
human condition through the medium of
photography. His images evoke the
deep-seated and often hidden fears and fantasies of his subjects,
compelling both model and viewer to explore aspects of themselves
of which they may have previously been unaware.
Christer's work
has been influenced by his life experiences. Although he began as a
musician and self-taught photographer early in life, he set both
aside following a personal tragedy. While he always had cameras
around him and liked the feel of them, he didn't return to
photography until many years later when asked to do a photo shoot
as a favor to the daughter of a friend. He is a prolific artist,
producing a remarkable quantity of high-quality images of great
originality and vision in the few short years since he re-dedicated
himself to photography.
He credits his upbringing in
Sweden with instilling in
him a passionate devotion to
equality,
justice, and
freedom of expression - an unswerving
dedication which is especially evident in his images of women..
A significant portion of Christer's work consists of black and
white images of women that reveal their beauty, strength, humor,
and resilience in the face of passion, subjugation, inequality and
violence. The power of his images provokes strong reactions,
positive and negative, causing his work to be periodically
censored.
Fans
of his erotic images note his ability to bring out the elusive,
deeply secret fantasy woman that most women see themselves as but
that they rarely allow anyone else to see, or even acknowledge to
themselves.
In other series of images, Christer's early life
experience as a musician and performer enables him to capture the
movement and vitality of dancers and musicians, many of whom hail
from New Orleans. These vibrant and colorful images place the
viewer squarely in the center of the event or performance,
providing a detailed glimpse of a special moment in time that would
otherwise be lost.
His masterful manipulation of light and
shadow lends many of his color images an ethereal quality
reminiscent of the
Impressionist painters of the 19th century. In
the black and white photography, shadows take on a life of their
own, appearing almost as distinct characters side-by-side with the
human models. The results are often images that seem to change
shape and substance, bringing to mind the prints of the Dutch
graphic artist
M. C. Escher.
Preferring to let his images speak
for themselves, Christer puts himself firmly in the background,
never letting himself be photographed unless there is a camera in
front of his face. Decrying the typical artists' statements as
pretentious attempts to obscure lack of vision or talent, he
prefers to state simply that "Who I am, where I was born, educated
- or not - where I live, what are my personal likes and dislikes,
what do I look like, do I have an ART education, how old am I,
etc., etc., is of no importance. The only thing that matters is
what YOU - the viewer of my images FEEL and THINK when you look at
my work."
Although his work is highly sought by groups and
individuals desiring a unique view of themselves or their events,
he carefully selects his commissions, requiring there to be a
meeting of the minds between himself and the subject before
undertaking the commission.
In addition to private commissions,
he also performs photography on behalf of charitable groups such as
the
Common Ground Collective. In
response to growing demand, he is currently planning a series of
master's classes to be offered in
Europe.
His work has been most recently published
side-by-side with photographers such as
Robert
Mapplethorpe,
Helmut Newton,
Mario Testino, and
Roy
Stuart by the well-known publishing firm of Carroll and
Graf.
In 2002, Christer established a studio in New Orleans. He
lost his studio and almost everything else when Hurricane Katrina
devastated New Orleans in 2005. Although still deeply affected by
the events, the artist has recently expanded his portfolio to
include his first-ever landscape images taken while visiting
Canada.
Bibliography
The Mammoth Book of
Illustrated Erotica /edited by Maxim Jakubowski & Marilyn
Jaye Lewis (New York : Carroll & Graf, 2002) 512 pages; ISBN
0-7867-0921-9The Art Fix, August
2005, Issue 74.External links
Christerart website
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