The objective of the residency is to develop Fortress of Shadows, a photographic project that documents the layered history of Suomenlinna through analogue and darkroom techniques. Sakib Saboor aims to create experimental images that reflect how memory and history overlap across time. The residency will offer the focus, space, and context needed to expand his practice, explore site specific methods, and connect with an interdisciplinary artistic community.
The residency project Fortress of Shadows will explore the layered history of Suomenlinna through analogue photography and darkroom-based experimentation. The island has been shaped by three distinct periods: Swedish, Russian and Finnish, each leaving visible and invisible traces in its architecture, landscapes and everyday life. Sakib Saboor wants to document these traces not through straightforward representation, but by working with multiple exposures, photograms and experimental printing that allow shadows, textures and absences to emerge. The project continues the artists’ practice of investigating memory, identity and belonging through analogue processes. In earlier works, he has used overlapping exposures to reflect how memories and identities are fragmented and multi-layered. At Suomenlinna, he will apply the same approach to the site itself, letting the past overlap with the present. The darkroom will play a central role in this process. The artist plans to create images that are as much about what is fading or disappearing as about what remains visible, using light and chemistry to echo the erosion of time on stone walls, tunnels and coastal landscapes. The residency provides both the environment and the concentration needed to develop this body of work while being part of a multidisciplinary community of artists in Helsinki. Ultimately, the project aims to create a visual meditation on how histories survive in place, shadow and memory.
About the artist
Sakib Saboor (b. 1999, Tønsberg) is a photographer based in Oslo, Norway. He holds a bachelor’s degree in digital marketing from Kristiania University College, with a specialization in photojournalism. His work centers on visual storytelling and the exploration of identity, with a particular focus on the relationship between past and future. He works within a documentary framework, using both analog and digital techniques.
His work has been exhibited at Fotogalleriet, Kunsthall Oslo, Fotografiens Hus, the Østlandsutstillingen (Nitja Centre for Contemporary Art and Galleri Fjordheim), Sandefjord Kunstforening, and the Oslo Negativ Photo Festival. He is represented in the collections of Preus Museum and the Møller Collection.