Viviane Sassen took up photography at the time she was working as a model in the 1990s and frequently posed for male photographers. The modeling experience inspired her to begin making self-portraits to reclaim her body and image. In this nicely produced and collectible Kominek edition, a number of self-portraits from the 1990s has been brought together.
The Book
Viviane Sassen, Self Portraits 1989-1999. Berlin: Kominek, 2024. Thread-stitched soft cover with French flaps illustrated on the inside, 58 pp. 26x20,5cm. First edition, first printing. Illustrated throughout with B/W and color photographs.
Condition: new
Viviane Sassen, Mirrors & Portals at the MEP
This monograph was published to accompany Viviane Sassen's Mirrors & Portals exhibition at the MEP (Maison Européenne de la Photographie) in Paris. The show brought together more than 200 works, covering more than 30 years of Sassen's photographic work. It included series such as “Umbra”, “Parasomnia”, “Flamboya” and “Roxanne” – and a selection of her fashion photographs, as well as her mixed media works combining photographic prints, paintings, collages and videos.
Vivian Sassen, art and fashion photographer
Viviane Sassen (born 1972) is a Dutch artist living in Amsterdam. She lived in Kenya as a child and has often worked in Africa. After studying fashion at the Arnhem academy, Sassen turned to photography in the late 1990s, transitioning from modeling to photography during her fashion studies.
"Bored with my classes, I became fascinated by the photographers I worked with and decided to move behind the camera. In art school," Viviane Sassen says. "I wanted to regain power over my own body. With a man behind the camera, a sort of tension always develops, which is often about eroticism, but usually about power.'
Sassen then developed a personal and recognizable photographic style often using shadow, geometric shapes and abstraction of bodies, which she attributes to the influence of childhood memories of Africa.
Renowned and respected equally for her fine art as for her innovative fashion images, she has created fashion campaigns for Louis Vuitton, Miu Mieu, Dior, Cartier, Armani, L’Oréal, Shiseido, Narciso Rodriguez, Stella McCartney, Hermès, Bottega Veneta, Phillip Lim and Missoni.
Viviane Sassen's work was included in the 2011 New Photography exhibit at the Museum of Modern Art. Major shows of her work include the Venice Biennial in 2013, a solo exhibition in 2017 at the Museum of Contemporary Photography, Chicago, and PHOSPHOR: Art & Fashion 1990-2023, a retrospective at the MEP, Paris.