EVERYTHING HERE IS FINE ONLY I FELL OUT OF A TREE THE FIRST HOUR I WAS HERE AND I ALSO CUT MY THUMB (2025)
“Everything here is fine only I fell out of a tree the first hour I was here and I also cut my thumb” tells a loving and layered story about intimacy and connection and it shows how generations change but that our behavior and our needs don’t.
“Knowing if I tell you everything everything will be all right,” my eighteen-year-old grandmother writes in a letter to her mother in 1944. The war is in full swing and I read that she has an independent character, that she is poetic, dramatic, messy even but also madly in love. She is also pregnant and unmarried. A complete correspondence follows between my grandmother, her mother and her grandmother. With the letters in my possession I fell headfirst into my young grandmother’s world, a world which is surprisingly recognizable. They way the women communicate with each other feels familiar. What follows is an exploration into six generations of women in my family. I literally zoom in on letters and images of all the generations, I photograph, I unravel and cut things up until I find what I was looking for: connection and belonging.
All texts are excerpts I distilled from existing correspondence written between six generations op women in my family in the period 1944-2024. All images are details taken by me from photos and other archival material shot between 1906-2024 and involve six generations of women in my family.
As a photographer, and previously as a theatre director, I have a love for the daily things which make us so human: namely the playful and tender aspects of our behaviour.
Trust, connection and belonging are the most important themes in my work and my subjects are often people closest to me. I explore our individuality and that what binds us. Everything here is fine only I fell out of a tree the first hour I was here and I also cut my thumb is my second book.
TODAY IS MY NEW FAVOURITE DAY/AND THERE WAS LIGHT (2021)
today is my new favourite day celebrates the purity and freshness of youth. Jennifer Drabbe, who spent a large part of her childhood at boarding school, watches with wonder and amazement how her daughters move about in the safety of a family home. Fascinated and inspired by this gentle world unfolding before her eyes Jennifer aimed her camera at them for over ten years. She captures unexpected moments and details. The scenes we witness are sometimes spontaneous, sometimes staged. The daughters used as actors. We are drawn into the images through the strong use of form and abstraction.
STONEWASHED (2023)
Ever fascinated by our behaviour I focus on playful moments encountered in daily life. About the series Stonewashed (2023):
“Hiking through the mountains in Oman my playfulness was reignited where least expected and I felt a connection and an intimacy with a culture still unknown to me. Rocks are placed to control the influx of water and material is used to prevent leaking: all part of an ancient irrigation system I find out. By removing the background, I turn them into installations of art as first seen by me. The objects look sterile and clean at a glance, but I love how they are actually dirty and alive with time.”
TIME/PASSAGE (2025)