These Are the Sigma Foundation’s First Photography Books

The Sigma Foundation has launched its first two images books, Hanataba by Sølve Sundsbø and Songen by Julia Hetta, marking the inspiration’s debut publications. Together, the releases symbolize a big step in Sigma’s evolving relationship with images, shifting from product-focused storytelling to long-term cultural and inventive engagement.

Hanataba by Sølve Sundsbø

Created by internationally acclaimed photographer and filmmaker Sølve Sundsbø, Hanataba presents a physique of labor that explores imagined types of life suspended between existence and invention. The photographs resist simple categorization, as a substitute inviting viewers into an area the place transformation, fragility, and permanence coexist.

“Sølve Sundsbø is inspired by sublimely beautiful forms of life which don’t exist. The result? Flowers of a sort, frozen between eternity and ephemerality, between fantasy and reality,” Sigma says.

Rather than functioning as a retrospective, Hanataba is conceived as a residing work, visually presenting an summary, painterly strategy to macro images that nearly blends the 2 media. It displays an ongoing inquiry into how images can assemble which means relatively than merely report it, aligning carefully with the Foundation’s broader ambitions.

“Photography is about creating something, not capturing something,” Sølve Sundsbø says in conversation with Sigma Nordic.

Sølve Sundsbø and the Act of Creation

Born in Norway and primarily based in London, Sølve Sundsbø has constructed a profession outlined by experimentation throughout images and movie. His work typically merges digital processes with meticulous bodily craftsmanship, leading to photographs that really feel each constructed and natural.

Central to Sundsbø’s philosophy is the concept that images is an additive and subtractive course of. He has described it as starting with every little thing current, then eradicating what doesn’t belong, a way that contrasts sharply with conventional notions of photographic realism. This strategy is clear all through Hanataba, the place every picture feels deliberate and authored. The work doesn’t depend on spectacle; as a substitute, it rewards shut consideration to type, texture, and refined shifts in gentle.

“When you take a photograph, you start with everything and then you remove. That is where meaning begins,” Sundsbø says.

Trust, Reality, and the Power of the Photograph

A recurring theme in Sølve Sundsbø’s work is the inherent belief viewers place in pictures. Even in an period of widespread picture manipulation, images retains a novel authority that continues to form notion.

Hanataba performs with this stress by presenting topics that really feel biologically believable whereas remaining solely imagined. The photographs invite perception, whilst they quietly undermine it, encouraging viewers to query what they settle for as actual. This ambiguity just isn’t offered as deception however as an exploration of images’s psychological energy, blurring the boundary between truth and fiction. The summary work highlights how photographs carry which means past literal fact.

“People believe photographs in a way they do not believe other images,” Sundsbø says.

“That trust is fascinating and dangerous at the same time.”

Songen by Julia Hetta

Released alongside Hanataba, Songen by Julia Hetta presents a markedly completely different but complementary strategy to images. Where Sundsbø’s work explores constructed and speculative kinds, Hetta’s pictures are grounded in stillness, emotional restraint, and a quiet attentiveness to time and presence.

“Julia Hetta, fresh from a residency in the Aizu region of Japan, presents a saga as true as it is poetic: a Japanese boy seeks the innermost spirit of Art, makes the long journey to Sweden – and ends up back in Japan,” Sigma says.

The photographs in Songen transfer between portraiture, interiors, and landscapes, typically rendered with tender gentle and muted tones. Rather than directing interpretation, the images invite contemplation, permitting which means to emerge slowly via environment and refined gesture. Faces, interiors, and pure components are handled with equal care, reinforcing a way of continuity between folks and place.

Within the context of the Sigma Foundation’s first releases, Songen demonstrates how subtlety and emotional presence can carry as a lot weight as conceptual experimentation. Its emphasis on temper, reminiscence, and quiet remark positions the work as an equal inventive assertion alongside Hanataba.

A New Chapter for Sigma’s Cultural Mission

The Sigma Foundation was formally established on July 18, 2025, as a devoted initiative to assist images as each an inventive and cultural apply. While Sigma has lengthy been concerned in competition sponsorships and academic initiatives, the Foundation indicators a extra targeted and sustained dedication.

“The Sigma Foundation was founded by Kazuto Yamaki, president of Sigma Corporation, to support and promote photography as an art form. Sigma is a Japanese manufacturer of photographic lenses and cameras. A deep respect for the arts guides Sigma’s engineering, as the company continues to develop and innovate products that support the passion of artists,” Sigma says.

By launching with authentic photobook publications, the Foundation positions itself inside the custom of images as a printed medium. The choice underscores the assumption that books stay some of the enduring and intimate methods to expertise photographic work.

Hanataba is launched alongside Songen by Julia Hetta, reinforcing the Foundation’s intent to collaborate carefully with artists relatively than act as a passive writer. Each guide is developed as an extension of the artist’s apply, not as promotional materials.

“We want to support photography in a way that allows artists to fully realize their vision,” Sigma Foundation says.

Craft, Precision, and Sigma’s Artistic Legacy

Sigma’s involvement in Hanataba and Songen displays the corporate’s long-standing emphasis on precision and craftsmanship. Founded in Japan, Sigma continues to fabricate all of its lenses and cameras at its Aizu manufacturing facility, sustaining full management over manufacturing.

This philosophy extends past {hardware} into cultural initiatives just like the Sigma Foundation. The identical consideration to element utilized to optical engineering is clear within the design, printing, and presentation of the Foundation’s publications.

By supporting photobooks as lasting cultural objects, Sigma reinforces the concept that images exists not solely as know-how however as a type of authorship and legacy.

“Photography deserves the same care in how it is preserved as in how it is made,” a Sigma Foundation spokesperson said.

Looking Ahead

With Hanataba and Songen as its first releases, the Sigma Foundation units a transparent path for its future. The emphasis is on long-term collaboration, inventive autonomy, and considerate presentation relatively than scale or velocity.

These publications counsel a mannequin the place company assist and inventive integrity aren’t in battle. Instead, they function in parallel, permitting photographers to discover complicated concepts with institutional backing.

As each books attain audiences via exhibitions and worldwide guide gala’s, they stand as particular person inventive statements and as a foundational second in Sigma’s cultural mission.

“This is only the beginning,” Sundsbø mentioned. “There is so much more photography can still become.”

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Image credit: Sigma Foundation, Sølve Sundsbø, Julia Hetta