Laura Book

Laura Böök (b. 1986, Finland) is a Helsinki-based documentary photographer. She is interested in documentary photography’s ability to speak about wider social changes through intimate stories, and prefers to work on long term projects, building strong relations of trust and collaboration with her subjects. Laura holds a BA in Documentary Photography from the University of South Wales, Newport. In 2014 her series Walking on Rivers was exhibited at the 21^st Noorderlicht Photofestival in the Netherlands and Singapore International Photography Festival, as well as in the exhibition Changing Realities in Berlin.

Walking On Rivers

There are more reindeer than people living in Pudasjärvi, a small town in Northern Finland. With the local population aging and drastically shrinking, the local council has set a goal that in 2018, one of ten residents would be an immigrant. It is an exceptional goal in Finland, where immigration started on a larger scale as recently as the early 1990s. It is also an exceptional goal in today’s Europe, where most countries try to keep their borders firmly closed and recession has led to a hardened social climate and more unwelcoming attitudes towards migrants.

The series follows the lives of Congolese families who have resettled in Finland to start a new life after more than fifteen years in refugee camps. At the same time it looks at the transition of the surrounding community, struggling to redefine its identity. Despite the goal of local politicians, Pudasjärvi is not what first comes to mind when thinking about multicultural communities, and that’s what makes it an interesting place to photograph. It remains to be seen how long these Congolese families will stay in Pudasjärvi. Some of the teenagers have already started speaking with the same certainty as their local peers about leaving small town life behind.

http://cargocollective.com/laurabook