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Fiona Tan
£11.95

Vox Populi, Norway

Fiona Tan (2006)

£11.95

Commissioned to make a new work for the Norwegian Parliament in Oslo, Fiona Tan collected family photograph albums from as broad and varied a background as possible, eventually selecting two hundred and sixty-seven images that would be individually framed and presented in the Parliament building. For this book, she revisits the entire collection of images – intimate family portraits that capture private if familiar moments: the birth of a child, birthdays, family gatherings, adolescence, holidays, brothers and sisters, first loves, favourite places. Loosely arranged within three familiar strains – Portrait, Home and Nature – unexpected cross-references and playful associations unfold.

While a visual document of a country’s people, there is nothing obvious that would identify Vox Populi, Norway as being Norwegian. The reader is drawn into a seductive and popular ethnography where images of the private and intimate challenge the ideology of official national portraits, and yet also assume a master narrative that defines the whole.

Vox Populi, Norway | Tan, Fiona; | ISBN: 978 1 870699 90 7 | Price: £11.95 | Classifications: Archival; Document; Pop/everyday; | Format: Offset printing; | Extent: 128 pages | Edition: 1,500 copies | Dimensions: 178 x 126mm | Designer: Gabriele Franziska Gotz; | Printer: Rosbeek, Nuth NL