About | Frijke Coumans

For press and work inquiries contact: frijkecoumans@gmail.com

BIO

Frijke Coumans is a photographer whose work moves between documentary and conceptual photography. Her images are imbued with a deeply personal perspective, exploring the tension between control and surrender, construction and instinct, ideals and the unruly nature of reality. She operates at the intersection of observation and staging, constantly questioning how photography shapes and influences our perception of reality.

For her, photography is not just a medium but a necessity: an urge to capture what seems intangible: the physicality of love, the quiet weight of uncertainty about the future, and the inevitable confrontation with the limits of control in a world obsessed with capital. The fluid boundary between fiction and reality remains a constant theme in her work.

“As for me, I see both beauty and the dark side of the things; the loveliness of cornfields and full sails, but the ruin as well. And I see them at the same time, and chary of that ecstasy. The Japanese have a phrase for this dual perception: mono no aware. It means "beauty tinged with sadness," for there cannot be any real beauty without the indolic whiff of decay. For me, living is the same thing as dying, and loving is the same thing as losing, and this does not make me a madwoman; I believe it can make me better at living, and better at loving, and, just possibly, better at seeing.”

- Sally Mann (2015)

Hold Still: A Memoir with Photographs