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GRÆSSULT
In the Fictional World of GRÆSSULT, Anders Hviid and Jonas Villumsen Bring Us to reality
Interview by Fay Harvey
Images by Anders Hviid
March 4, 2026
GRÆSSULT, translating to “GRASS HUNGER/PITCH HUNGRY,” is described by its publisher as a football book, but also not a football book; a picture book, but also not a picture book. While it may be hard to categorize, it is not hard to love.
Within the 220 pages, a beautiful tale is told that centers on a man sending electronic postcards to a God that he doesn’t initially believe in, but seeks to find and hold close as he searches for stability. Through Villumsen’s words, themes of vulnerability, imagination, ritual, and reality flow on the pages, while Hviid’s stunning imagery, which has been collected over the past two years throughout the Copenhagen football landscape, shine as the story’s backdrop.
A diamond in the rough of football literature, GRÆSSULT is graced by a sensitivity and humor not often found in the genre. Throughout the story, we visit eclectic themes and traces of memories that any reader can see themselves in: “superstitious rituals involving coffee cups, divorce, the erratic nature of the seasons, fictional reportage, ticks you mistake for mosquito bites, shadowboxing, the life and death of houseplants, life and death in general, the parallel universe of pre-season friendlies, uncles who may or may not have played for Real Madrid, communities and solitudes.”
The two artists took the time to share details about the book’s creation, imagery and an excerpt directly from the book’s pages. Keep scrolling to enter the world of GRÆSSULT.
To make GRÆSSULT a new addition on your bookshelf, grab yourself a copy here.
What inspired this story?
JV: A combination of real, personal events and the desire to describe some of the life that takes place beyond the chalk lines in the world of football. For many people, football is not just a phenomenon happening during the roughly 90 minutes (plus added time) played on weekends, but something that influences their entire daily life, their routines, their dreams, and large parts of their identity. Just as football colors people's lives, it also colors the sport itself—something especially noticeable in lower-league football.
What makes this book different from past publications?
JV: In this book, the primary focus shifts from the events on the pitch to those in the stands. Football plays a significant role, but it is not results and tables that take center stage; instead, it is the rituals, culture, and diversity that are highlighted—the soul of the people. Last but not least, the book has a very personal perspective, which helps to portray the inward aspects of going to football matches. While matches are a shared experience, they are also highly individual. I wanted to depict this—to make life with football a kind of microcosm of a whole human existence.
In what ways does football create a special world through fiction?
JV: Within cycling, there is a strong tradition of capturing the poetry of the sport. This perspective can also be applied to football, and it offers a wonderful freedom to detach from match reports, instead approaching it more openly. I believe something special emerges when you allow yourself to overlook the measurable parameters, which sport largely consists of, and instead make room for some of the more abstract aspects of the experience. My feeling is that the sport still makes sense even when, for example, results are removed from the narrative. Play and seriousness form two stable cornerstones at each end, and they are in themselves so monumental that they are enough to balance a work.
How has the process of writing fiction been?
JV: In many ways, it has felt quite familiar. I am an avid reader, and although I enjoy sports literature, fiction has always spoken more to me. It has been a liberation to approach it as fiction, in the sense that one can write about everything that happened and about everything that didn’t happen.
What was the photo selection process like, and did it come before or after the writing?
AH: The process of creating images for Jonas’s text was from the start influenced by the constraint that my photographs do not have a direct relation to the text. It has been a special and interesting challenge to create a viewing universe that functions as a visual backdrop throughout the book. I have constantly related to space and people as elements to construct an honest and sober depiction of the Copenhagen stadiums. It was important for me not to interpret and not to make the images deliberately glossy. I photographed analogly with medium format, and the slow pace of that format suited the project incredibly well. It also gave the images an interesting and unique expression. We consume so many images, and I aimed to show a style that takes the viewer somewhere else than what we normally associate with football images.
What do you hope people feel from reading this story?
JV: I hope that people will feel that this book is a personal matter, with football as its anchor. That it can help bring back the scents and smells of football. That it is a step away from the clinical, hyper-commercialized perspective. That it smells of grass, sweat, spilled beer, and has the sensation of dust rain, magical evenings, evenings when magic is absent, superstition, euphoria, and beautiful hangovers.
An excerpt from GRÆSSULT:
From the corner of the park, someone yells something to the linesman about needing glasses. It’s a bit early for that kind of heckling, considering there’s still about twenty minutes to go before kickoff. The beer stand queues have suddenly grown with alarming speed. A group of players in training bibs are wandering around the pitch, amusing themselves by kicking a ball straight up — and very high — into the air. The first few times it comes down with snow on it; eventually, it doesn’t come down at all.
The pitch is the opposite of artificial turf. It’s completely real and looks like a war veteran, worn down by the sun’s relentless bombardment over the past few weeks. It reminds me a bit of my own scorched hair after a full day in a cap. Yellow flowers have strayed across the white chalk lines, brightening the dull green carpet. That, on the other hand, is not something I often experience in my hair after a full day in a cap — festive as it might have been.
On the row in front of me, a scene unfolds that seems at odds with itself.
A man is singing along to I Want to Break Free.
Queen’s potent hymn of freedom struts confidently out of the stadium speakers. It almost sounds as if the fighting spirit of the snare drum is coming from inside my own head. But the man singing along is an elderly gentleman, and his voice is the thinnest, most fragile parchment I’ve ever heard. He’s no Freddie Mercury — granted, few are — but this man is more like Steve Buscemi filtered through a year’s worth of helium balloons. Without warning, his voice repeatedly shoots up into a trembling mountaintop of unintended falsetto. It disappears entirely into the upper atmosphere, turns into a puff of wind. He looks exhausted from the start. From a distance, it almost seems as if he has onion rings under his eyes. But it doesn’t stop him — he keeps singing. And he means it. No matter how many times the almost nonexistent wind carries his almost nonexistent voice off toward Utterslev Marsh, he keeps on meaning it.