You Forgot Me
You Forgot Me spans around the elusive memories collected to recreate long lost aspirations, goals, and dreams. The meta-idea touches on the component of time through triggering memories of the past and intensifying those by mixed mediums used in the project.
The simplicity of the concept of the universe and possibilities as restated by a child is often overlooked. We encounter the beauty of the world represented by the sun and the house, the dreams represented by words as ‘astronaut’, ‘I wish’, and an image of a treasure map.
The team includes Julius Bohlin, Elin Jensen, Emil Daniel, and models Daniil, Freja, and Ava, who became an intrinsic and valuable part of the visualization of the memories. The story is shot on film, except for some photographs, which involve a mixed medium approach of wrinkling the photos and recapturing those on digital. Julius explains the main thought behind the series, “I have made a portrait series about all our lost ideas and memories, showing with scribble and wrinkled prints.”
We engage in a conversation with Julius and Elin to discuss the concept of lost ideas through the prism of their childhood experiences, the approach to recollect those experiences from the talents on set, and the eventual stylistic decision to use those as part of the characters.
Photography Julius Bohlin HMUA Elin Jensen Photo Assistant Emil Daniel Talents Daniil Koudryavtsev at Slash.ten models Freja Nygren at SG Commercial / People Ava Moosavi at Slash.ten models
‘Since finding my old watercolor set from the late '90s during a quarantine clean out recently, I've been enjoying zoning out and into myself through the painting’
— Elin Jensen
What is the most memorable lost and found idea you recently rediscovered?
Julius: When I was a kid my parents forced me to take piano lessons, which I later started to reject, and unfortunately I stopped. But now I’ve found a way back to playing the piano, and I’ve discovered that mixing music with photography is just beautiful. Therefore, I will not only focus on still images but also films for my future projects. Sometimes in collaborations with producers, artists, and composers, and sometimes making the sound on my own.
I also have a memory from being 5 years old, sitting on my bed in my father's country house, when I first got in touch with the questions of time. I remember how I tried to count and sort of save the seconds as they disappeared as I counted the next one. It was both frightening and beautiful since it showed me the fragility of life even though I didn’t have words for it back then. It is not a specific idea, but more of a deep well of questions which I often go back to for inspiration. In this project, time itself was used as an element as I wanted to create a portal between our present and our memories.
Elin: I would have to say watercolor painting! The creative kid in me definitely survived her way into adulthood, which I'm enjoying, especially through my work with hair and makeup.
But as much as I love being on set with a team, there is something magically soothing in being alone and completely losing oneself in a moment of creating. Since finding my old watercolor set from the late '90s during a quarantine clean out recently, I've been enjoying zoning out and into myself through the painting...
‘One drawing is of a house on a sunny day with a classic child-drawn sun. We thought that almost everyone could relate to it since everyone at some point had drawn that specific sun and house’
Each model has a drawing on her face with figures, symbols, or text. What were some of the memories that emerged from your past or perhaps the models’ past which led you towards the specific drawings?
Julius: Well, one drawing is of a house on a sunny day with a classic child-drawn sun. We thought that almost everyone could relate to it since everyone at some point had drawn that specific sun and house. A child’s idea of a simple and sweet world.
Another one is a robot on Daniil's cheek. This is because of my own drawings of robots or monsters from when I was a child. It can also be seen as an alien, and all of that ”foreign” was fascinating back then, and still is. We spoke about what our biggest dreams were when we were children, and ”an astronaut” came up for some of us, so we decided to draw that as well. Then we have the treasure map on Ava. What treasure it is, is up to each one of us, but the adventurous search for it is mutual. Here we used a classic, and almost pirate-inspired map, with rocky mountains, a forest, and lines to show the path. I also remember the fear of being lost or abandoned by someone, especially a parent. When you were in a shopping mall or just the grocery store, and suddenly your mum wasn’t there. I thought that I was forgotten even though she was just around the corner.
Why did you choose to work with portraits and shoot on film?
Julius: One inspiration for this shoot was old family portraits and school photos. I certainly wanted to create pictures that were (the overused word) timeless to take the observer back in time, and therefore I chose to shoot on film. The shoot is in one way personal and based on my own and my team's memories, but it’s also meant to be as relatable as possible for everyone. To make you think of your own lost and found thoughts or ideas.
‘I put a lot of focus on the prep work of the models' faces, making sure that the skin looked plumped and hydrated just like when we are young. Subtle glow and rosy cheeks. Bushy brows and minimal eye makeup’
— Elin Jensen
What were the main guidelines for hair and makeup in terms of the atmosphere you wanted to create with the team?
Julius: I wanted the base makeup and hair to be quite natural and unfixed to focus on the drawings. Then I showed Elin, who did the artwork, a lot of suggestions of drawings which I made on small pieces of paper, and then we discussed with the entire team which ones to do. The text was written with the wrong hand to recreate the handwriting of a child.
Elin: For this project, the desirable youthful glow became more central than ever. I put a lot of focus on the prep work of the models' faces, making sure that the skin looked plumped and hydrated just like when we are young. Subtle glow and rosy cheeks. Bushy brows and minimal eye makeup. I wanted the hair on Ava and Freja to be airy and full, mimicking the natural volume from running around playing all day. Daniil's bangs received a neat combing, as when getting ready for the school picture to be taken.
‘anything that invites the observer to your process can get the work to stand out and give further value to it’
— Julius Bohlin
Today, there is a tendency to merge mediums with a desire to create something new through an exploration of possibilities, such as mixing film, digital, and handcrafting. What will be some of the upcoming trends or explorations in the near future, in your opinion?
Julius: One thing that’s just growing and growing is 3D, and the mix of that manufactured reality against the captured reality in a picture could gain a lot of interest, I think.
But I also think that today when almost everything we see is on a screen, it becomes much more essential and appreciated with physical pictures, as prints, books or magazines. And to add just a bit of that ”physical” in your process, as I tried to do with the wrinkled paper, is something I think we will see more of, at least from me.
In my opinion, anything that invites the observer to your process can get the work to stand out and give further value to it. If we look back at Julia Margaret Cameron, born in 1815, I think that one thing that makes her pictures so beautiful are the flaws, such as the dust and scratches on film. Also, the often rounded framing which reveals how the film was processed. It makes us understand how it was done, and we can get involved in another way, and through that, value it even more.
