This is a story about learning to swim in the water Narcissus drowned in. At the core of photography lies a mirror - a borrowed fragment of life printed on a piece of paper. However the image it carries is not as simple. It is the ultimate narcissist that wishes only to be observed, so compelling that it convinces us into believing it represents reality due to its indexical value. But it is an ...

Finding roots and narrative form through global aesthetics and proximity Images that circulate widely on social media play a decisive role in shaping how social and political realities are produced, perceived, and contested. Far from being neutral, these images contribute to the formation of cultural and territorial identities, reinforcing dominant narratives while also holding the potential to ...

“Before one leaves” was inspired by my observations of the many Burundian women leaving for the Gulf countries in search of economic opportunities. These migrations are often told through the lens of the promises, risks, or consequences of departure. However, I was drawn to a much more subtle moment: what happens before one of them leaves. When I met Justine and Florence, two sisters and ...

“Ja sam poslednja” (“I am the last one”) is a personal project about my father and me. Throughout our lives, we shared many similarities, both physically and emotionally, yet in the years before his death we gradually lost the closeness we once had. The distance that grew between us became an important part of our relationship and, after his passing, left many questions unresolved about who he ...

Greif Alumni and emerging practices at the 57th edition of the festival The opening days of the 57th edition of Les Rencontres d’Arles have begun. Running under the theme “Des mondes à relire” (“Worlds to Reread”) and directed by Christoph Wiesner, the 2026 festival focuses on visual complexity, transmission, and nuanced representation in contemporary photography. A central point for emerging ...

My photographic story, “Hause” Spiele, is a journey across borders, seen through the lens of a camera. Moving from Ukraine to Germany was not simply a change of residence; it was a deep immersion into a different culture, mentality, and way of life. This forced displacement compelled me to seek anchors in an unfamiliar landscape, transforming my artistic practice into a vital tool for emotional ...

With its temperate climate, spice-filled air, and warm people, old Stone Town on Zanzibar island does more than welcome its visitors. It invites them into the details of its everyday life. Afternoons around the sea wall close to the Forodhani Gardens slowly fill up with anticipating spectators, all waiting for the jumping Zanzibari youth, also known as the “Makachu jumpers”. Jumping off the ...

Inside "Ich seh’ etwas, was du nicht siehst": How Fondament x Der Greif’s photography open call is challenging German society clichés The photography project "Ich seh’ etwas, was du nicht siehst" (“I Spy with My Little Eye”) is an open call for images that show Germany through the eyes of the people who live here. In this interview, initiators Josefine Cox (Managing Director, Fondament and ...

“Ich seh etwas, was Du nicht siehst”: Fondament x Der Greif open call launches to challenge perspectives on social life in Germany At Der Greif, we have always believed that photography is at its most powerful when it stops giving simple answers and starts asking complex questions. It is this exact philosophy that drives our latest collaborative project, an open call titled "Ich seh’ etwas, was ...

In a world where human consciousness transcends the limits of flesh, “YICHU 1.0” explores the raw emotional journey of transformation, self-reconstruction, and collective evolution. As a three-chapter experimental moving image work, the project traverses protopian futures, digital embodiment, and AI-mediated identity. Through a blend of machine-generated visuals, layered soundscapes, and ...

The arts have long provided a crucial space for self-expression and identity to explore ways of being that are often restricted in other contexts. With "Queer Quintessential," we bring together LGBTQIA+ lens-based artists who use visual language to question, describe, and reframe contemporary queer life. This exhibition delves into chosen family, deep intimacy, and the quiet tensions between ...

Get to know the artists behind the Der Greif “Queer Quintessential” online exhibition for Pride Month framing Pride as protest Der Greif presents the launch of the online exhibition, “Queer Quintessential”, exploring queer life, community, and self-representation. This special online exhibition endeavors to expand cultural comprehension and foster a more inclusive conversation within the art ...

"White Barracks" is the third chapter in the "Girl’s Universe" series, a broader inquiry into the fractures that develop within power structures. While the first part, "White Noise: The Reincarnation of the Pure," explores the spiritual construction of belief systems, and the second, "Girl’s Town," delves into the material construction of home, "White Barracks" shifts its focus to the internal ...

The latest photobooks picks by Der Greif “In Focus” is Der Greif’s photobook review series, spotlights our picks from the current open call for submissions and our community artists' most recent publications. This month, we bring out of our shelf a duo of photobooks on the preservation of certain community practices between reality and cultural myth and the performativity of fighting in today’s ...

“Ysanthem” is an ongoing series of photographs made at sites of historical preservation since 2021. These sites include indoor and open-air museums, reenactment spaces, and areas of historical significance throughout the Midwestern United States and beyond. More specifically, the project is a pursuit of the unique, uncanny boundary between the realities and fictions that are produced within ...

Immigration returned me to a state of childhood — everything unfamiliar, the same helplessness, except now you are your own parent. I began rebuilding from fragments of old desires. First, scents came back: freshly cut grass, a pond with water lilies, a forest after rain. Memories I hadn't touched in decades, arriving unbidden in a city that was not mine. They felt like directions — back toward ...

Four views on proving existence, safe spaces for visibility, and archiving chosen histories Who is allowed to represent Queerness, and what kinds of queer images are granted legitimacy as they circulate? Queerness is highly marketable, endlessly demonized, and constantly dissected, despite how many queer people, including myself, still move through the world calculating disclosure carefully to ...

When people talk about what it means to be queer, about same-sex marriage or other concerns of the LGBTQIA+ community that have long met with repression from mainstream society, they typically focus on young people. In the images in our heads as well as the ones that circulate in the media, queerness is closely associated with youth. Due to societal stigmatization and discrimination, many of ...

“Johannesburg Seen” is an ongoing photographic exploration of Johannesburg’s complex urban landscape, capturing the people who inhabit its margins and in-between spaces. Working within the inner city and its surrounding neighborhoods, this visual documentary examines how ordinary people cultivate meaning, dignity, and beauty amidst the profound contradictions of contemporary South African ...

Eva Rivas Bao discusses her work exposing the violence faced by Imane Fadil during the Berlusconi era Images that circulate widely on social media play a decisive role in shaping how social and political realities are produced, perceived, and contested. Far from being neutral, these images contribute to the formation of cultural and territorial identities, reinforcing dominant narratives while ...

Guest room is a format that fosters collaboration and sparks creative exchange. For this edition, curators Auronda Scalera and Alfredo Cramerotti explore "Shifting Thresholds". "We live in a time when the ground beneath us, political, social, technological, ecological, and even perceptual, feels in constant motion. Borders shift, narratives fracture, and the coordinates through which we orient ...

In these portraits, adolescents stand before the camera within a visual language shaped by Renaissance and Baroque painting, defined by frontal compositions, chiaroscuro, and direct gazes. These formal structures draw heavily from a long tradition of looking. “Heirs” is a series that takes this inherited gaze as both its material and its core subject. The title remains deliberately ambiguous, ...

Get to know the artists behind the Der Greif “Inner Landscapes” online exhibition for Mental Health Awareness Month Der Greif presents the launch of the online exhibition, “Inner Landscapes”, in honor of Mental Health Awareness Month. This special online exhibition endeavors to expand cultural comprehension and foster a more inclusive conversation within the art community through the diverse ...

How do our internal worlds mirror the external structures around us? With "Inner Landscapes," launched during Mental Health Awareness Month, we present a selection of lens-based works that explore mental health as a dynamic negotiation with daily life. The artists in this exhibition navigate the delicate tensions between support and fatigue, stability and imbalance, individual reflection and ...