Pikin Slee, Photography by Viviane Sassen, 2014.

Known for her unique approach to fashion photography, Viviane Sassen has taken yet another stylistic detour in her latest collection, which focuses on the inhabitants of a remote village on the Upper Suriname River. Largely shot in black and white, the informal photos explore Sassen’s personal connection to the village, which is inhabited by the ancestors of former slaves who escaped Dutch rule. “This project is an exploration of the beauty of the everyday,” writes Sassen in her introduction, “an investigation of the sculptural qualities of the ordinary.”