I have been making staged photographs for the past 15 years. A Statement by Aino Kannisto.
I have been making staged photographs for the past 15 years. I build fictional scenes that I record with the camera. I set up the scene, costume and make-up myself for the pictures. Building a complete visual world for a photograph is essential for me. I play the protagonist in the pictures; however, they do not represent reconstructed situations of my life. They are projections of my internal emotional landscape. In the deepest sense, they could be defined as self-portraits. I use photography to communicate. It is a way of fulfilling my need to express my experience of existing in the world in such a way that I am able to touch other human beings. For me, making pictures is a way of dealing with emotions. It is a source of immense creative energy and pleasure – a way to give meaning to life by sharing a part of the world, which otherwise would remain private. I am influenced by the surrounding world, literature, cinema and photographs, as well as not so easily located images, such as memories, daydreams and nightmares. The individual pictures are untitled, as I do not want to define them for the observer.