My latest project The world is somewhere else is a documentation of Scandinavian suburban life. Just plain daily middleclass life as it turns out for a lot of people in Sweden. Not very exiting, daily life usually is’nt, but also very seldom documented. Like there’s a white spot between the stories from all those picturesque villages and violent city districts. The name of the place where I grew up is Rydebäck, a large suburbia situated along the coast of Öresund in the south of Sweden. I left it some 40 years ago to start my own life, and in this project I'm back to see what's changed since I left. As it turned out not that much has actually changed. Well, the decor has been updated of course, but otherwise it's the same middleclass dream based on prosperity and comfort.
Sometimes I get a feeling that a suburbia like Rydebäck is a place that isn’t in touch with the rest of the world. That the world is distant with all it’s conflicts, streams of refugees and crises. Everything and everyone seems molded into the same shape and nothing is allowed to disturb the harmony. The lawns are mowed, the kids sent to school and sometimes the neighbours come over for dinner. Saturdays are football practice, grocery shopping for the week to come and a carwash. The disasters and conflicts of the world are hardly noticed at all. Well, there’s usually a beggar sitting by the grocery store, but that is as far as the world reaches. But of course there must be those that care and act. They might be involved in politics, NGO’s or something similar in neighbouring places. But not in Rydebäck. That’s where you live. The world is somewhere else.
Per-Olof Stoltz is a photographer living in Gothenburg, Sweden. He has worked as a professional photographer since 1989 in news, magazine and advertising, and has produced several projects that have been exhibited in Sweden. His latest project The world is somewhere else was also turned into a book. For the last +10 years he has used photography as his artistic outlet, not as his living. He has always been working in the photojournalistic/documentary realm. He believes that the image is a superior way to tell a story, to reach the viewer, and has a passion for showing those everyday lives, and signs of it, being lived quietly. Those stories that normally aren't told, unless disaster has struck. Because there's a story to be told everyday in life.