6-year-old Asger Carlsen is channeling his inner James Deen. Perched atop a motorbike, he greets the camera with a stolid expression that holds a hint of suspicion. In another picture he is a cherubic looking toddler with a head crowned by a patch of white-blonde hair. These days Asger’s photos—even the selfies—have a decidedly different aesthetic. His distorted portraits bend, twist and manipulate human flesh in ways that range from small tongue-in-cheek changes to towering human sculptures and homogeneously blob-like shapes.

Unsurprisingly just about every synonym for “bizarre” has been used to describe Asger’s surreal offerings. And while his eerie body of work—which has been exhibited and published worldwide—may produce a bit of head scratching for viewers, Asger’s influences and inspirations turned out to be surprisingly tame. No Tofu dropped by the artist’s home studio to chat about art, life, Facebook deviancy and the perils of working from home.

So, I hear you started as a crime scene photographer. How did you transition from that to the kind of things you do now.
When I did that it was a long time ago. You know that?

Yeah, you did it for like 10 years or something right?
Yes, I was really young. I was a very determined young man. I also did commercial photography for magazines.

Was that kind of a morbid thing? I imagine taking crime scene photos might be.
Yeah.

Did any of it go on to effect your work in the future?
My mental state.

And your work?
It made me slightly crazy.

Really?
No, I’m only joking. It was just…I don’t know, I was really young and it was just kind of exciting. You got to work for a newspaper and then you’d go out to these incidents or accidents and photograph for the newspaper. But in that process you had to see some not-so-nice things, but that was part of doing it. I wasn’t so sure of my artistic ambitions at that time.

So you didn’t always know you wanted to be an artist?
I wanted to be a photographer. I knew that when I was in high school. I had no confusion about that part of life.

That’s awesome.
Yeah.

Obviously you live and work here. How does that work for you? Do you set up parameters between your personal and work life?
I worked freelance for about 24 years and it’s still hard.

So what do you do? I know when I work at home sometimes I sit in my bed and get distracted by the black hole that is the internet. 
And then you have to take a nap.

Very true.
And do laundry and cook.

Personally I really hate laundry, but I like cooking.
The problem for me is that I’m on the 6th floor and I love walking the stairs. So if I have to go down it makes sense for me to bring my laundry.

Every single time?
No, sometimes I’ll go pick up something or go do something because I’m already out. The fact that I decide to do that can confuse the day a little bit.

Do you ever find yourself being less productive because you have a shared studio and living space? Or have you mastered the art of balancing the two?
Oh yeah, I’ve had studios for short and long periods of time but for whatever reason I just ended up moving back home to work. It’s always a challenge I think. Discipline is number one if you’re a freelancer or artist.

I was reading a little about other people’s reviews and reactions to your work and there’s been a lot of different descriptors. One person called it “grotesque” another person said it was “weirdly sensual”, and the list goes on. If you had to describe your work, other people’s opinions aside, what would you say about it?
My work? How would I describe it? It’s a photo-based material that is shaped or formed into open interpretations.

So when people look at it you want them to interpret it anyway they want?
I don’t really want to tell people how they should feel about it.

How do you feel about it?
Me? I feel…I have difficulties with it.

Why?
I don’t know, it’s kind of like: why do you have to do this, is it necessary? I mean is it really necessary? But the fact that I could do something else with my skills was more important.

Have you ever encountered a situation where someone has written a review of your work and assigned a meaning to it that you had no intention of conveying?
No not really, but people tend to automatically assume because I do this work that I’m very strange or like a deviant or something. I don’t know, maybe I am. I don’t think it’s that bad.

I don’t think it’s deviant.
No it’s not but people are always like: I can’t figure you out. What is it you’re trying to say? You know that sort of thing. You should see what people I don’t know send me on Facebook. It’s like every time they see something strange or weird they just send it to me on Facebook or email, assuming it’s something I’d appreciate. It is sometimes, but not always. You know I also just go to Starbucks and work like anyone else. I’m not living an outrageous, wild, deviant lifestyle.

I know you don’t want to tell people what to think about your work but have you ever had a situation where the perception was something negative or damaging that you didn’t want?
No, I don’t really get offended. The only thing is I’m really not trying to comment on people or society or politics or gender.

Your work is very sculptural. How did you start melding these shapes and pieces of people together?
I was really obsessed with Francis Bacon. I really liked him a lot and I admired his work. I don’t know if this happens to you but when I look at something–not necessarily another artist–and find it inspiring, maybe a couple weeks after I might do something that’s a bit similar. In this situation I was finishing up my first project which was Wrong, which was also my first step in moving away from photography–well traditional photography. So for Hester it was like an impulse, it was a glimpse of an idea in a way. I was running and I said: “You can do this and that and put it together”. Of course it was very raw…I can show you the first one I did.

Yeah? I would like that a lot.

Wait, are these your baby pictures? Is this little you? [At this point I obviously stumbled across a cache of Asger’s baby pictures.]
Yeah.

How cute! 
It’s from the ‘70s.

You look very serious.
Right? People were more serious back then. I don’t think I liked that.

I never smiled in my pictures when I was little either. I’m always looking at the camera like it’s about to do something terrible to me.
Yeah, I think it was difficult taking pictures when you were younger.

[Here Asger shows me the first manipulated image he ever made.]

How long on average does it take for you to do this?
Well this is really like the first one so it’s changed a lot.

Is this one person or do you kind of take pieces of different people and fuse them together?
I do take different people. There are also a lot of photos that involve me.

Oh really?
Yeah, I just get undressed and then I photograph myself.

So how much time does it take you to finish one image?
Now I can do it a lot faster, but this project [Hester] I worked on it for 2 1/2 years. I went back to it a lot because I became better all the time so I had to go back and improve.

How do you know when an image is done?
It just needs to feel like one piece. I want it to be a real organic object. It takes a long time.

Do have an image in mind while you’re working? Like another point of inspiration or an end vision?
Yeah, sometimes I’ll try to sketch it out before I do it just to have some kind of foundation. There’s also different artists that I’m inspired by.

Besides Francis Bacon?
Yeah.

Like who?
Henry Moore, he’s a sculptural artist.

—Stephanie Smith Strickland