Gerben Groustra is originally born in the Netherlands. After travelling most of the world, he finally settled down in Norway. He is married to a Norwegian woman, and have two grown up children.
Having more or less grown up in an art-collective, he has developed an artistic approach to life,  from sketching, painting, and now finally: photography. He also has a passion for fly fishing and fly tying. Leirfjord community, where his family is living, the beautiful surroundings are perfect for both fly fishing and photography.

The last few years, Gerben has left film-based photography, and is now mainly using digital equipment. Most of  his stuff is delivered by Canon. Several digital houses, and a wide range of lenses are his tools. He's also a dedicated Mac-fan, and all his pictures are stored on a PowerMac. Photoshop CS3 and Aperture 2 are his favourite software. A new toy in the toolbox, a Hasselblad H3D2 31mpix medium format camera, has made large format printing even more technically perfect.

Documentary photography visualises his great knowledge of ethnology. His first major photo project was to document the similarities between two very different nomadic peoples, the Sami people of Scandinavia, and the Tuareg peoples of Sahara. Gerbens first contact with Tuaregs came through his interest for sight hounds. The Tuareg version of sight hound is called the azawakh, or Idi in Tamasheq language








 

This portrait of Gerben is taken in the beautiful nature of Leirfjord, only a few kilometers from his home. (Photo: Bjørn R. Pedersen)

updated 31.01.2010