INHALE | VIVIANE SASSEN

Viviane Sassen, born in Amsterdam in 1972—where she currently lives and works—spent much of her childhood in Kenya. This dual anchoring, between Europe and Africa, has profoundly shaped her worldview and artistic language. Despite her Dutch origins, she often felt like a foreigner in Kenya, out of place in the context around her. Yet even after returning to the Netherlands, she continued to experience a sense of alienation, as if no place could fully embody her identity.

This introspection lies at the heart of the Parasomnia series, within which the photograph Inhale is situated. In this work, Sassen stages an enigmatic and unsettling portrait: the woman’s face is partially obscured by cut leaves that cover her eyes and mouth, leaving only her nose exposed. The only remaining active sense is smell, as if to suggest a form of inner perception—deeper and more instinctual.
The entire composition is immersed in a rarefied atmosphere: both background and body are wrapped in white fabric that neutralizes any chromatic distractions, guiding the viewer’s gaze toward the essential, symbolic gesture that gives the work its title: Inhale. Sassen thus constructs a suspended visual dimension—somewhere between dream and reality, between what is seen and what is sensed. Her work opens a portal onto an almost otherworldly realm, evoking dreamlike associations while remaining deeply human.
The silence that permeates Inhale, combined with the apparent stillness of the scene, evokes the tradition of memento mori: everything is still, everything is silent—yet each detail carries a subtle but powerful awareness. It is in this frozen space that the inexorability of time is most deeply felt. Sassen uses light, shadow, and color in a sculptural and meditative way to convey life’s transience and give form to hidden thoughts, to those stirrings of the unconscious that rarely find expression.

The work is part of the exhibition This Body Made of Stardust, curated by the artist herself and presented by Collezione Maramotti on the occasion of the Fotografia Europea festival.

Viviane Sassen
This Body Made of Stardust
Collezione Maramotti, Reggio Emilia
Until July 27, 2025
Collezione Maramotti 

Viviane Sassen
Inhale
2011
c-print
50 x 40 cm
© Viviane Sassen
Courtesy of the artist and Stevenson (Cape Town, Johannesburg, Amsterdam)

07/05/25