Among his neighbors - selected photographs by John Alinder

 

1915.

Major Alström’s wife with the owl, 1932.

 Painters Lindgren and Torell, 1919.

Siri Johanson in confirmation attire, 1931.

Ljung’s daughter standing by herself on a chair, 1920.

 Miss Linnea Ekenberg and Emil Johanson, 1919.

Stråle’s dog sitting with eyeglasses, 1922.

Agnes Johansson (right) and friend, circa 1915-20.

Erik Längquist, 1918.

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John Alinder (22 December 1878, Sävasta, Altuna parish - 12 August 1957, Sävasta, Altuna parish), Swedish photographer. The son of a farmer, he was born in a village in Uppland, a province in eastern central Sweden; he remained in the village all his life. But he chose not to take over his parents’ farm and instead became a self-taught photographer and something of a jack of all trades. He was also a great lover of music, and held the Swedish agency for the British record label and gramophone maker "His Master’s Voice." For some time he ran a country shop from his home, and he apparently even operated a bar for a while. Beginning about 1910 and continuing two decades, he photographed the local people, his neighbors and friends, the surrounding landscape, and their way of life. He portrayed them informally, using the technology available of the time - glass plates - which he then developed in a small darkroom he had built.

Alinder's work came to light in the 1980s when a curator found more than 8,000 of his glass plates languishing in a library basement.

Self-portrait, John Alinder in his garden, circa 1910-20.

A book of a selection of his work has since been published by Dewi Lewis Publishing in Great Britain, available through their website or through Amazon.