Made with Kleap
Lena Åsheim

About

A camera, a notebook, and a lot of patience.

Black and white portrait of Lena by a window

Lena Åsheim · Södermalm, 2024 · Pentax 6×7

I've been making photographs for ten years — most of them on medium-format film, almost all of them quietly. I'm based in Stockholm, I split my time between commissioned portraits, a handful of weddings each year, and a small amount of personal travel work that I publish when it feels ready.

I grew up outside Tromsø, studied photography in Oslo, and moved to Stockholm in 2017. I learned the craft in a busy wedding studio where I was the second shooter for three seasons — it taught me to read a room, to anticipate, and to work fast without ever feeling rushed. Those are still the muscles I rely on.

My work has appeared in Kinfolk, Cereal and Slowdays, and a small print edition of my Gotland work is kept at the Royal Library in Stockholm. I'm a quiet, slow photographer by trade and by temperament; if that sounds like the kind of person you want in the room, I'd love to hear from you.

Outside of work I run a lot, badly, in the forests around Södermalm. I keep a small darkroom in the studio where I develop black-and-white film on Sunday evenings. I read more than I probably should.

Method & equipment

Slow tools, slow look.

On film

Pentax 6×7 with a 105mm lens for most portrait and wedding work. Mamiya 7II for travel and landscape. Portra 400 in summer, Tri-X pushed one stop in winter. I develop the black-and-white myself.

On digital

A quietly-specced mirrorless body I use for low-light indoor work and for any client who needs a fast turnaround. I edit in Lightroom and Capture One, with a soft, desaturated palette that matches the film work.

On the day

I arrive early, I work from a list rather than a shot list, and I keep the day moving. I don't direct heavily. I do pay attention — to the light, to the room, to the small things people do when they forget a camera is there.

On the edit

Film is sent to a small lab in Gothenburg. Digital is colour matched to the film work before it reaches the client. A typical session returns 60 — 90 edited frames per hour.

A short timeline

Ten years, slowly.

  1. 2014 Started assisting in a wedding studio in Oslo.
  2. 2018 Went out on my own from a small studio in Södermalm.
  3. 2021 Switched almost entirely to medium-format film.
  4. 2023 First cover for Kinfolk. Travelled to Vietnam and Lofoten.
  5. 2025 Booked solid through summer. Teaching a small workshop.

Selected publications

A few places my work has lived.

I publish slowly and infrequently. The work has been fortunate to find editors who think the same way.

  • Kinfolk Issue 51 — The Quiet Issue — Cover essay + 12-page portfolio, "On Looking Slowly" 2024
  • Cereal Volume 28 — Travel feature, "Notes from a Slow Summer in Gotland" 2023
  • Slowdays Annual No. 04 — Print portfolio, "Stockholm, in seven windows" 2024
  • Cereal Volume 22 — Wedding portfolio, "Sofia & Pelle" 2022

Let's make something quiet and true.

Get in touch