Jacob Aue Sobol (born 1976) is a Danish photographer. He has worked in East Greenland, Guatemala, Tokyo, Bangkok, Copenhagen, America and Russia. In 2007 Sobol became a nominee at
Magnum Photos and a full member in 2012. Four monographs and many catalogues of his work have been published and widely exhibited including at
Yossi Milo Gallery in New York and at the Diemar/Noble Photography Gallery in London.
Born in Copenhagen, Sobol lived in Canada from 1994 to 1995. Back in Europe he first studied at the European Film College and from 1998 at Fatamorgana, the Danish School of Art Photography.
In the autumn of 1999, he went to the remote East Greenland village of Tiniteqilaaq to photograph. The visit was only supposed to last a few weeks but after meeting a local girl, Sabine, he returned the following year and stayed there for the next two years, living the life of a fisherman and hunter. In 2004 Sobol published
Sabine, which in photographs and narrative portrays Sabine and describes his encounter with Greenlandic culture. The pictures in the book express the photographic idiom he developed at Fatamorgana.
In the summer of 2005, Sobol went with a film crew to Guatemala to make a documentary about a young Mayan girl's first trip to the ocean. The following year he returned to the mountains of Guatemala, this time by himself, to stay with an indigenous family for a month to document their everyday life.
In 2006 he moved to Tokyo to spend 18 months photographing the city for his book
I, Tokyo. Commenting on the book, Miranda Gavin appreciates how
"the sensitivity of his approach shines through the work and sets him apart as one of a new generation of photographers with the ability to allow eroticism and danger to seep through his images without becoming sordid or clichéd."
Sobol became a nominee of Magnum Photos in 2007 and a full member in 2012.
In 2008, Sobol worked in Bangkok where he photographed children fighting for survival in the Sukhumvit slums, despite the country's growing economic prosperity.
In 2009, he moved back to Copenhagen. Since then he has worked on projects at home as well as in America and Russia.
Source: Wikipedia
Following his time in Tokyo, Jacob worked extensively in Bangkok, resulting in the 2016 book
By the River of Kings. In 2012 he began photographing along the Trans-Siberian Railroad and spent the next five winters photographing in the remote Russian province of Yakutia for his project
Road of Bones. He has ongoing projects in Denmark (
Home) and the United States (
America).
Source: www.jacobauesobol.com
