HL: Was it the beginning of the day when you’re in her room and she’s in that orange outfit drinking coffee?
SJ: Yeah, probably. And then walked around the garden and then ended up at the pool. And Casey (Storm) just had a duffel bag of clothes, so it was just me and Casey and our other friend Scott who was my photo assistant and helped me with the whole underwater housing. But it wasn’t a big production in any way. And when I look back, I’m like, “How did we shoot that many photos
in two, three hours maybe?” As soon as I met her, it was instantly natural. But before that, I thought she’s sort of mythical, or you don’t know who she is. She’s this mystery from another dimension or something. And then as soon as I met her, I was like, “Oh no, she’s just this awesome Icelandic girl from a punk band.” And she’s from that scene and I’m from this scene, but they’re the same scenes just from different cities. That’s why she was so down. She didn’t have any entourage. She didn’t have a publicist. She didn’t have a hair and makeup person. I was like,“Oh, okay. We’re just going to make something together.” Our friendship still sort of meets at that place. She’s just this Icelandic punk who probably can drink a lot more vodka than, well…definitely can drink a lot more vodka than I could.
HL: She’s otherworldly.
SJ: So otherworldly, yeah. She was just roaming around the Chateau. If you’re at any other fancy hotel nowadays, within five minutes of shooting photos, the security would be there. And nobody cared at this time. I don’t even know if they even had a security guard.
HL: Some of my favorite photos are the ones of her going down the hallway and then kind of peeking her head back and you see these random body parts going up and down the hallway through the door. I feel like looking at all the contact sheets I live through the day with you and her because I saw the sequence of the day. It’s almost like you were just like, “Throw that blanket over your body and jump on the bed.” And she was like, “Sure.” There’s one of her really close up with this blanket around her face and it’s shot so beautifully in black and white.