Ole Marius Joergensen Captures What Goes on “Behind the Curtains”

When asked about his main interest in photography, Ole Marius Joergensen once said that rather than capturing a version of reality, he loves to create illusions. The Oslo based photographer has a background in film that shows in his cinematic and atmospheric images, described as appearing almost unreal, or as Joergensen puts it, “a Norwegian strain of surrealism”. This is especially true of his new series “Behind the Curtains,” a surreal set of images shown through the eyes of his inquiring subjects, and catching them in moments of forbidden fascination.

“Behind the Curtains” has beginnings in Joergensen’s earlier work, which has seldom depicted acts of innocent voyeurism, and makes us think about what sparks our curiosity as human beings. This includes his series “Space Travels through Norway”, following an astronaut as he travels the country’s landscape, stopping in places that are beautiful but probably less interesting to the locals, much as a tourist would. A newer series, “Peeping Tom”, depicts characters “peeping” at others through holes in the wall, or through binoculars, a la Alfred Hitchcock’s classic film Rear Window.

“Visually speaking, I love the old-fashion way of peeping, not the kind we all do today through the web; so I tried to create a sort of “old days” atmosphere,” Joergensen says. The photograph in “Behind the Curtains” takes his narrative one step further, exploring the reasoning for our obsession about those around us, and the consequences of this. “Norwegians like their privacy, and yet some people’s curiosity can be obsessive…” he explains. “Many times, I have looked at windows and wondered, what’s going on behind those curtains. My project is an attempt to unravel some mysteries.”