Markus HENTTONEN
1976, Finland
Markus Henttonen (born 1976 Lahti, Finland) first got interested in photography through his skateboarding hobby in the´90s. He wanted to see better pictures in the finnish skateboarding magazines so he started to photograph those himself. It didn´t take him long to realize that this was what he really wanted to do, take pictures.
Markus studied photography in Turku Arts Academy in Finland and graduated 2002. Since then he has been working as an artist photographer as well as freelance photographer for both editorial and commercial assignments.
Barcelona is the city where the art career really began. In 2001 Markus got the opportunity to go there for a six-week training course to do his graduate project. He had no idea what to do when he arrived. But he got such an inspiration from the city that not only did he end up with an interesting project he found the theme that he wanted to explore through his photography, the urban environment. After graduating Markus moved to Barcelona and continued with the topic. Paral-lel City, Winter Holiday, To be on View and City Constructions are the series that started while living there.
Since the Barcelona days Markus has slowly shifted towards more dramatised and narrative photography. The focus is still on the relation between people and their urban living environment.
Coming from a small town Markus has always been interested in the metropolis, big cities full of life and people from all over the world and of course the impressive architecture. You could say that his approach to photography is that of an urban explorer.
The works of Markus have been shown in over 70 exhibitions in both Finland and numerous other countries; Germany, France, Spain, Sweden, Russia, Poland, China, Italy, Monaco, Denmark, Austria, Norway, Netherlands...
His second book Lonely But Not Alone was published in September 2011 in Finland. The first one Paral-lel City was his graduate project and came out in 2004.
The recent series Night Time Stories received second prize at the International Biennale of Photography in Kaliningrad, Russia in 2009. The series was also presented in the International Photography Festival in Lodz, Poland in 2011.
Markus is currently represented by Galerie Arktika in Germany, Galerie Vanessa Quang in Paris, France and Korjaamo Gallery in Helsinki, Finland.
When not photographing Markus likes to grab his guitar and play some music. Or sneak out to the skate park to do a few old school tricks with his skateboard.
Source: http://www.markushenttonen.com/index.php?/project/bio/