Ten years after his first monograph Dead Traffic, the London-based Danish photographer has now published his second book. Starting with the images taken in one of the toughest slums of Freetown, the capital of Sierra Leone, Thue is now presenting Lode, a multi-layered retrospective of his last ten to fifteen years of work. This time, the hard-hitting series of images is also complemented by shots from his extensive travels in China, Iceland, Spain and his hometown London. We spoke with the photographer about the genesis and background of Lode.

In 2012 you published your first monograph Dead Traffic – now long out of print. With your new book, a long and very personal journey seems to have come to an end?
Yes, 10 years between books is a crazy long time. To explain the gap, I might simply say that a sequence of personal events took place, which knocked my productivity and killed any momentum I had built as a photographer with the first book. Also, in hindsight I feel like elements of Dead Traffic were maybe a bit rushed. Being a more youthful and excitable version of myself, I don’t think I allowed enough time for fine-tuning the work and enough emphasis on the edit. With Lode I definitely wanted to make sure not to repeat that scenario.

The Covid pandemic lockdown period also played a part?
That’s true. At the time when the first lockdown was announced, I was working in a music venue and was subsequently furloughed, as obviously no gigs or gatherings of crowds were allowed to take place. Like a lot of people in the hardest hit industries, I was basically paid by the government to stay at home with my family. Prior to this madness I had completely disengaged from my own photography. I had spent a significant amount of time editing other people’s images and books, but my own work felt locked and in a stalemate. All I knew at this point was that I had tons of unseen material, in the shape of dusty negatives and contact sheets in drawers. No plan, no structure. It wasn’t until Covid hit that I was presented with a rare opportunity to free up mental space, and given time to properly start focusing and exploring the options around making a second book. Then, a few months into the editing process, the spark of the Black Lives Matter movement blew up a broader discussion about inequality and set the world on fire. This had a huge impact on me and also changed the path of the book for sure. I’m well aware of my position of course, but as someone who has witnessed societal imbalance first hand, I do hope that the content of Lode might translate into something that could, potentially, be seen as a miniscule contribution to what is undoubtedly a very complex and polarizing debate. Returning to your question, it started off as a simple act of escapism in order to keep myself mentally occupied and sane through lockdown and turned into something else. I see the result as a book heavily influenced by the times, which ultimately came together through a new-found sense of clarity, persuading me that I had something to say again.

How did you go about selecting the material for the book?
With Lode I tried to allow myself enough time to find a rhythm, enabling me to be led by the images, as opposed to the other way around, and often by my gut rather than logic. Generally speaking, I would describe my approach as intuitive and experimental, but still with no images selected, especially the harsh and difficult ones, unless I felt like they were serving some sort of greater cohesion. It was a lengthy and challenging process for sure, but today I might regard the edit as my biggest achievement with this book.

Did you find a more poetic and open approach here?
Yes, Lode definitely presents a broader scope to the viewer in terms of both subject matter and the way it may be read and interpreted. Obviously, the logical explanation for this would be the fact that, contrary to Dead Traffic, which was all shot in one location, its content is generated from a much larger and diverse pot of images. Some shot in Freetown, some in Yorkshire, some in Xinjian, etc. It was surely my intent, but whether it comes across as poetic and empathetic will be solely subjective to the eyes on it, and perhaps not for me to declare. My deliberate lack of hand-holding and provided context might be troublesome to certain viewers, but as Robert Doisneau once famously said: “To suggest is to create; to describe is to destroy.” Like him, I don’t hold all the answers and, as with any creative output, all readings are valid.

How strongly do you feel that you went through a kind of catharsis with Lode?
Given the extensive material, different trips and stages of my life that the book was sourced from, it certainly felt like a bit of a beast to get off my chest. An ambiguous beast, which once released into the wild I’m aware has been left vulnerable to attack due to its sensitive nature. I’m convinced there’s an element of catharsis to all my work, and it’s probably the main reason why I photograph in the first place. With Lode however, there was an even acuter sense of drawing a line under something that had become a pressing issue in my head. An attempt to get to the bottom of what had gone before, in order to move on, both creatively and on a personal level.

Will you continue to work with your Leica R9?
Well, I have carried this model with me for nearly two decades now, and more than likely I will stick to what I have and what I know. I guess like me, my work might also mellow over time. Either way, the slate is wiped clean so there might be a third book in another 10 years’ time. Maybe sooner, but I can’t make any promises.

Kim Thue was born in September 1980 and grew up in Grindsted, a small town on the Danish peninsula of Jutland. He has lived in England since 1998, where he earned a BA in Editorial Photography at Brighton University. His work has been exhibited and published internationally. In recent years he has shot numerous promo videos for bands such as Iceage and Lush. During the Corona lockdown, he devoted himself intensively to his archive and compiled his second monograph Lode. He lives with his family in London. Find out more about his photography on his website and Instagram page.

Issue 3/2023 of the LFI Magazine presents a portfolio of Kim Thue’s work.

KIM THUE: LODE
248 pages, 140 black and white images, 20 x 27 cm, English, Skeleton Key Press.
Essay by Edward Dimsdale; design by Martin Andersen/Andersen M Studio
First edition: 500 copies

© 2022 Kim Thue and Skeleton Key Press / Russell Joslin Publishing