PURITY by DAVID MAGNUSSON

Transcription

1 PURITY by DAVID MAGNUSSON

2 David Magnusson David Magnusson (b. 1983) lives and works in Stockholm, Sweden. He studied at the Nordic School of Photography Biskops-Arnö. He works as an artist and a freelance photographer for clients such as Save the Children, TIME Magazine and Svenska Dagbladet. David has received awards and honors from The Swedish Arts Committee, The Swedish Authors Fund, Picture of the Year International, Picture of the Year Sweden, and was also selected for the World Press Photo Masterclass. His first monograph Purity was published in March 2014 during a solo exhibition at Fotografiska, The Swedish Museum of Photography, in Stockholm. Purity has received several awards and has been featured in international media such as The Guardian, Huffington Post, TIME Magazine, Der Spiegel, BBC and The Daily Mail.

3 Purity exhibitions include: Kalmar Konstmuseum, Kalmar, Sweden, 2014 Fotografiska, The Swedish Museum of Photography, Stockholm, Sweden, 2014 Kulturparken Småland, Smålands Museer, Växjö, Sweden, 2014 Pictura Gallery, Bloomington, IN USA, 2015

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6 Purity When I first heard about the Purity Balls I imagined American fathers terrified of anything that might hurt their daughters or their families honor. But as I learned more, I understood that the fathers, like all parents, simply wanted to protect the ones that they love in the best way they know how. It was also often the girls themselves that had taken the initiative to attend the balls. They had made their decisions out of their own conviction and faith, in many cases with fathers who didn t know what a Purity Ball was before first being invited by their daughters.

7 The more I learned, the more I was surprised that I had been so quick to judge people I knew so little about. I was struck by the idea that what set us apart wasn t anything more than how we had been influenced by the culture we grew up in and the values it had instilled in us. In Purity I wanted to create portraits so beautiful that the girls and their fathers could be proud of the pictures in the same way they are proud of their decisions while someone from a different background might see an entirely different story in the very same photographs. To me, Purity is about how we are shaped by the society in which we grow up and how we interpret the world through the values we incorporate as our own. - David Magnusson

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9 Will Roosma & Nicole Roosma, 17 years Tucson, Arizona You often hear jokes about fathers standing at the door with shotguns trying to keep the boys in line, but I m just not that type. Purity is very important to me in regards to my daughters and I ve always entrusted them to make the right choices and to do the right thing as far as purity is concerned. It s a gift that you should keep for that special someone that you know you could have a future with. It s not something that someone should take for granted. My dad and I talked a lot about what purity meant during the night of the ball, which was nice. Purity to me just means a promise between a father and a daughter. It s a hard promise to keep, because there s a lot of temptation for people my age. Peer pressure is hard. But I think that if you can keep the promise it will strengthen your family relationship, your personal relationships, and your relationship with God as well.

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11 Pierce Nunley & Jasmine Nunley, 15 years Grand Caine, Louisiana We re all sinners and that s a part of what happened a long time ago in a certain garden. After that we can t go away from being sinners but we can aim to be pure and to do God s work. To aim to live in a godly way is what it means to strive towards purity. I got the idea to go to the ball from Jasmine. She came home one evening and told me about it. I had no idea that such a ball existed. As a father it made me very proud that my daughter would come to me and ask to be part of this. So really I don t think there was any other answer than yes. I think this is a very important commitment that goes both ways. The speaker spoke about how chastity and purity affected her life, how she had trusted God and waited for the right guy to come. She said that even if you haven t lived a pure life, you can always restart and commit your chastity and purity to God again. He s always going to forgive you. At the end, we spoke our vows to each other, looking into each other s eyes. At that point I was crying and I could tell that a lot of girls were just letting go of agony that had been in their hearts. They were letting it go because they knew that their fathers were there for them.

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13 Kameryn Wilson, 14 years, Randy Wilson & Kaalyn Wilson 9 years, Colorado Springs, Colorado We don t have the daughters sign anything at our Purity Ball, because we feel that puts undue pressure on them. If they choose to, they can join a procession to place a white rose at the base of a cross as a symbol of their decision. We definitely do not want to communicate that they aren t good enough if any of them would happen to fail, and we want to lift any burden of guilt off them. Life is all about relationships, not about performance, because we all fail eventually.

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15 Edition Pricing Archival inkjet prints (unframed) Small 24 x 30 edition of $ $ $ TBD Medium 43 x 54 edition of $ $ $ TBD Large 60 x 74 edition of 3 1 $ $ TBD

16 For more information Lauren Kniss : lauren@picturagallery.com Mia Dalglish : mia@picturagallery.com Lisa Woodward : lisa@picturagallery.com picturagallery.com artsy.net/pictura-gallery 122 W 6th St. Bloomington, IN