What is hidden behind the need to collect, own and catalogue photographs? Can collecting become an obsession? What is the value of the photographs we want to keep with us? If you wish to experience culture outside the internet, Fotofestiwal invites you to Lodz between 6 and 23 August. The festival programme will focus on truly exceptional, original, bold photographic collections. This year, the exhibitions will also be available online.
Thanks to the determination and support of partners, artists and curators, this year’s edition of the International Festival of Photography in Lodz will be held in the post-industrial spaces of Art_Inkubator – two months after the originally planned date – between 6 and 23 August. Due to safety reasons, the programme of the event will focus mainly on exhibitions. While meetings with the audience will be limited and organised online, there will still be some special events available to visitors. Two exhibitions – one in the Muzeum Sztuki ms1 in Łódź and the other one in the so called Motyl UŁ building (with an unmistakeable butterfly-mural) – will be opened in autumn. The main theme of this year’s exhibitions is collecting as a form of art, habit, passion, and sometimes obsession.
During this year’s edition of Fotofestiwal, we will get to know extraordinary collectors. All of them have been building their unique collections for years, making them very original compilations of photographs, selected based on unconventional criteria and often originating from surprising sources. Thanks to their determination, passion and obsession, they have managed to create inspiring stories about the contemporary society and breakthrough moments in the history of the 20th and 21st centuries. Apart from amateur photography, the collections also include works that have been displayed in prestigious museums around the world and at a number of international festivals. The common denominator of all this year’s exhibitions is that, with one exception, the collectors themselves will become their main narrators and curators.
oo’s & iii’s is a selection of works from two collections of New York curator W.M. Hunt: Dancing Bear, consisting of magical, intriguing photographs of people with their eyes closed, obscured or otherwise invisible, and Blind Pirate, which is a collection of photographs of various groups from before 1950, including American soldiers, workers and students. The emphasis for this show is on abstraction and shape with oo’s being eyes, faces, heads and circles and iii’s representing densely grouped crowds of people, looking like masses of vertical lines. Hunt’s collections, photographs found in a nearby thrift shop appear right next to works by such artists as Diane Arbus or Robert Frank.
Jean-Marie Donat focuses on amateur photos only. He rummages for them at flea markets all over the world, finds them on the Internet and creates compilations which he then releases as self-published photo books. Often, certain recurring motifs can be found in these images: men flexing their muscles, posing with cars, scratched out faces of disliked people, holiday family portraits with a traditional “white bear”. All this makes up a funny and bitter self-portrait of the world in the 20th century.
The last, but not least, element of the international part of the Festival’s main programme will be the Hungarian Fortepan collection, created by Miklós Tamási. This thoughtfully curated collection of photographs by István Virágvölgyi from Robert Capa Center in Budapest is currently one of the most interesting digital archives of vernacular photography that has been made available on the Internet – and it all started with a bag of photographs found in a trashcan. The collection now consists of hundreds of thousands of photographs – retrieved from cellars, garbage bins, antique shops, but also donated by individuals and institutions –
and it has been proving since its very conception that there is a talented artist in every family from the beginning.
The closing exhibition of the Festival programme will be presented in the Museum of Art in Lodz, this time a bit unusually – in the autumn. It is the outstanding collection created for more than 30 years by the well-known French art promoter and merchant Antoine de Galbert, founder of the private La Maison Rouge museum in Paris. His collections contain over three thousand exhibits. Antoine de Galbert is known for his unconventional approach to exhibiting his works. One of his previous exhibitions, The Wall, was made in collaboration with an IT specialist, using the Monte-Carlo method. A randomly generated algorithm selected works solely on the basis of two indicators: image size and inventory number. For Fotofestiwal, Antoine de Galbert prepared a curatorial exhibition titled The Burning House, which shows the contemporary world in crisis. The exhibition will include works by politically and socially engaged artists, including Christian Boltanski, Boris Mikhailov, Jonathan Horowitz, David Goldblatt, Mikhael Subotzky, Yoho Tsuda.
The festival programme will include, as always, the Open Program section (formerly Grand Prix Fotofestiwal) – a result of annual open call and cooperation with an international jury. The projects of the six selected artists present the most interesting and the latest phenomena in contemporary photography. They address such issues as: selfie factories in the USA, Polish migration to the South American countries during the partitions the interwar period, military-themed summer camps for kids in Eastern Europe or the problem of radioactive waste – they present a cross-section of the most interesting and current trends in contemporary photography. This year, works of the following artists will be presented: Jorge Fuembuena, Kata Geibl, Máté Bartha, Marcel Rickli, Katarzyna and Marianna Wąsowska and Sheila Weiler.
In response to the current global economic situation, the organisers decided to reduce the ticket price to a symbolic amount. For safety reasons, parts of the programme involving the audience will be significantly limited and organized online. The programme of this year’s edition encourages you to devote more time to experience the exhibitions and exceptional spaces of unique Lodz.
Fotofestiwal – International Festival of Photography in Lodz
6-23 August 2020
Lodz & Internet
More info about the Fotofestiwal – International Festival of Photography in Lodz: www.fotofestiwal.com
Programme news: https://www.facebook.com/events/451900638974793/
Organized by Fotofestiwal in Lodz and Krakow Photomonth Festival, the Photo Match will be hosted online this year. The artists will show their projects during four days, between the 3rd and 6th of August. On the 7th of August, they will be matched with the reviewers and the portfolio review sessions will take place in a digital system from 11am to 4pm.
There is an open call to participate in the sessions and showcase. Projects must be submitted online until June 30th here.
The Photo Match’s model breathes new life into the traditional formula of portfolio reviews through placing a special emphasis on the series of open networking events, public presentations and an equal status granted to the reviewers as well as all artists. Twenty reviewers and twenty authors will be invited to participate this year. The list of reviewers includes magazine editors, book publishers, photography festivals’ directors, museum curators, gallery owners, independent art consultants:
Franek Ammer, Fotofestiwal
Alex Bocchetto, Akina Books
Shannon Ghannam, Magnum Photos
Angel Luis Gonzalez, PhotoIreland
Joanna Gorlach, Krakow Photomonth Festival
Karol Grygoruk, Rats Agency
Virgilio Ferreira, Porto Biennial
Michael Itkoff, Daylight Books
Kasia Kubicka, independent editor
Pablo Berástegui Lozano, Salut Au Monde
Amie Norris, ACN Studio
Marina Paulenka, independent curator
Liza Premiyak, Calvert Journal
Tereza Rudolf, Fotograf Festival
Aaron Schuman, independent curator, educator
Enrico Stefanelli, Photolux Lucca
Ben Weaver, The Wire, Here Press
Lars Willumeit, independent curator
Istvan Virágvölgyi, Capa Center
Salvatore Vitale, YET magazine
Due to the pandemic, Camera's Masterclass program will be entirely online this year. In this edition, Camera offers a three-week Intensive Online Course in Visual Storytelling organized with the ICP-International Center of Photography of New York, from July 13 to 31.
The lessons will be held online by American and British teachers. The whole course costs 490 euros. You can apply online until July 6: http://camera.to/en/didattica/icp-online-intensive-course-in-visual-storytelling/
On July 16 and 23, Camera and ICP will also host a live on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CameraTorino/
Under the title ON/OFF, PhotoIreland Festival will take place 8-19 July with a special programme adapted to the safety measures due to the pandemic. This year, the festival will be brought to you through two separate channels, navigating virtual and physical worlds: online with stimulating participative events, and offline, both in print, capitalising on the forthcoming OVER journal, and at The Library Project.
Online activities feature a collaboration with Fotomuseum Winterthur and The Photographers’ Gallery to deliver a special Screen Walk, and with Fotomuseum Winterthur for an exclusive presentation of their programme of SITUATIONS – a series of onlinepropositions – SITUATION #202.
The programme will be complemented with the Tokyo International Photography Competition 2020 that offers a wide range of practices from around the world. It will be displayed at The Library Project, Dublin, 1-26 July.
More information and the full programme can be found here: http://festival.photoireland.org/
Our partner from Turin (Italy), CAMERA – Centro Italiano per la Fotografia will present its selection of new Futures talents in a special event on the 2nd of July.
During the Hotel Panorama (Futures Edition), CAMERA invited Marina Caneve (Belluno, 1988), Camilla Ferrari (Milan, 1992), Camillo Pasquarelli (Rome, 1988), Giovanna Petrocchi (Rome, 1988) and Marco Schiavone (Turin, 1990) for a talk with Giangavino Pazzola, coordinator of the project and Walter Guadagnini, director of CAMERA. They will talk about their practice and project some of their work.
The event will take place at Camera’s internal courtyard for free. Due to the pandemic, to participate, it is necessary to make a reservation through the email prenotazioni@camera.to.
HOTEL PANORAMA (Futures Edition)
CAMERA – Centro Italiano per la Fotografia - Via delle Rosine, 18, Turin, Italy
July 2, 9pm
Free
Reservations: email to prenotazioni@camera.to
More information: www.camera.to
In 2020, PHotoESPAÑA will host one of its most unique editions. The exceptional situation around the world caused by the coronavirus health crisis has prompted substantial changes in all areas of our lives, including changes in the way we live and interact, which the Festival is experiencing as well.
Despite having been hatched under exceptional circumstances, the 23rd edition of PHotoESPAÑA, which will last through 31 October this year and encompass almost all of Spain, will focus on important digital projects.
The outdoor exhibitions, which spotlight and pay homage to the role that balconies and windows have played in recent years, are extending to 50 cities all over the country, with a simultaneous opening of the shows in the #PHEdesdemibalcón (#PHEfrommybalcony) call for photos. This initiative invited citizens to use photography as a means of expression and communication in such difficult times. Madrid, Barcelona, Santander, A Coruña, Salamanca, Seville, Córdoba, Las Palmas, Vitoria-Gasteiz and Pamplona will turn into festival venues, and their residents will expand the list of artists participating in this encounter with photography and the visual arts.
The confinement, from the viewpoint of and as a source of inspiration for professional photographers, will be the point of departure for a wholly digital project put together with the assistance of the Enaire Foundation, which will bring together works made in recent months by authors like Bego Antón, Carlos Spottorno, Carma Casula, Cristina de Middel, Eduardo and Rafael Trapiello, among others, on the Festival website. The OFF Festival has also been planned as a digital project this year and further extended to galleries all over Spain, which will showcase the work of one of their artists this summer. Yet obviously, PHotoESPAÑA would never turn its back on the programming in museums and art centres in Madrid, Alcalá de Henares, Alcobendas, Barcelona, Santander and Zaragoza, the Festival’s usual venues.
These shows will feature famous international and Spanish artists, as well as new voices who can use the festival to showcase their works. The programming will include major collective shows—Japanese photography from the 1950s and 1960s; the Magnum photographers’ views of the human body; and a survey of the relationship between art and fashion from the lenses of great artists like Helmut Newton, Moholy-Nagy and Francesca Woodman.
The major individual shows will feature works by Adriana Lestido, Danny Lyon, Maria Magdalena Pons and Lee Friedlander, among others, while Spanish photography will be represented by artists like Ramón Masats, Koldo Chamorro, Piedad Isla, Miguel Trillo, Alicia Martín and Juan Valbuena.
For the full programme, access here.
The artist Dávid Biró, nominated for Futures in 2018 by Capa Center, presents his new series 'Do you accept cookies?' at the Trapéz Gallery in Budapest, Hungary. The exhibition is open from June 9th to September 18th.
In his newest series, Biró carefully examines the mechanism of face-recognition systems. In the works, he created face-imitating installations, in order to experiment
on what the human eye recognizes as a face, and what appears to be a face according to the algorithm of mobile cameras as well.
Find out more about his project here.
Dávid Biró - Do You Accept Cookies?
Trapéz Gallery, Budapest
Henszlmann Imre street 3., Budapest, Hungary, 1053
www.trpz.hu , www.birodavid.com
June 9th - September 18th 2020
Every year, Futures organizes and supports a series of events throughout Europe. However, due to the Covid-19 pandemic, our local activities for the next months are being postponed or adapted to the digital world, following the guidelines by European governments and the WHO.
We will keep you updated about these activities, including online events that are currently being organized by our project. Meanwhile, follow us on social media and here to discover what’s new in contemporary photography.
From November 7th to 10th, the 23rd edition of the Paris Photo brings to the Grand Palais a big programme dedicated to professionals, collectors and enthusiasts. Some of our Futures talents will take part of the event in exhibitions, talks, and book launches.
We selected the Futures’ highlights in and alongside Paris Photo 2019:
GRAND PALAIS. Curated by Osei Bosun, the Curiosa Sector this year is dedicated to emerging art. The duo Elsa & Johanna was invited to exhibit in the sector, where they show works from the series A Couple of Them. On November 8th, at 6pm, they will also participate in a talk with the sector’s curator and the artists Leandro Feal, Nydia Blas, and Nathaniel Lewis.
Meanwhile, Máté Bartha’s works will be presented by the TOBE Gallery at the main sector (booth D31).
Inside the book signing programme, on November 7th at 4pm, Francesca Catastini will also sign her new book ‘Petrus’ published by Kehrer (booth SE7).
SATELLITE EVENTS. Outside the Grand Palais, Vincent Levrat will launch his new book from the project ‘Outburst’, published by Ciao Press. The event will be hosted at Los Patos (23 Rue de Nemours, Paris) on November 8th at 7.30pm.
On November 8th, the talent Jean-Vincent Simonet will open his studio (21 Rue Basfroi, Paris) with Andreas Lumineau from 6pm to 10pm. They will present the installation ‘Brace! Brace!’.
At the Galerie Joseph Paris (4-6 Rue de Braque, Paris), Julie Poly is part of the show group LensCulture Discoveries 2019. The exhibition presents works from 52 award-winning photographers from 21 countries. Meanwhile, at Espace Lhomond (21 Rue Lhomond, Paris), the talent Aisling McCoy is presenting together with the artists Shane Lynam. The opening is on November 7th, at 6.30pm.
More information about Paris Photo 2019: www.parisphoto.com.
Futures will host a series of events during Unseen Amsterdam 2019. This year, the project will have its own space at the festival, inside the Westergastheater. This space will work as a headquarters, bringing together the 12 members of Futures and the 69 emerging talents with a programme of showcases, talks, lectures and private meetings. The activities are focused both on the festival's visitors and on the project's talents in order to increase the capacity, mobility and visibility of new artists in Europe. Unseen Amsterdam will take place at Westergas from the 19th to the 22nd of September.
SHOWCASE. During the four days of the event, Futures will present artworks from the 69 artists and collectives selected for this year. These emerging talents were chosen by 12 leading photography institutions in Europe: British Journal of Photography (UK), The Calvert Journal (UK), CAMERA (IT), Robert Capa Contemporary Photography Center (HU), FOMU (BE), Hyères Festival (FR), Fotofestiwal Lodz (PL), PHotoESPAÑa (SP), PhotoIreland (IE), Photo Romania Festival (RO), Triennial of Photography Hamburg (DE), and the Unseen Foundation (NL). The showcase will take place inside of the Futures’ space at Westergas. A publication about the talents will also be released during the event.
PROFESSIONAL MARKET. The events will be focused on increasing and amplifying the professional opportunities for the artists. On Friday 20th Sept, ‘Futures Conversations’ will take place; private meetings with experts from the field such as international curators, collectors and editors. On Saturday 21st, experts from the Creative Europe programme will join the event in a talk dedicated to grants opportunities for artists and cultural institutions within the EU. On the same day, the lecture ‘How to translate your work to a bigger audience and make it relevant’ will see the dialogue between the editors of The Calvert Journal about the relation between words and images as well as the lecture ‘Challenges in the artists' professional practice’ moderated by PhotoIreland director Ángel Luis González Fernández will be about steps in an artist’s career.
ING UNSEEN TALENT PROGRAMME. In a partnership between ING, Unseen, and Futures, five Futures Talents from 2019 were selected as finalists for the ING Unseen Talent Award. They are: Elena Aya Bundurakis, Ulla Deventer, Irene Fenara, Kevin Osepa, and Karolina Wojtas. Coached by Adam Broomberg, from the artistic duo Broomberg & Chanarin, the artists are producing a new body of work. The result can be seen at the exhibition ‘Nature of Change’, during Unseen Amsterdam. The winners will also be announced in the event.
WOVEN MATTERS. Inside Unseen Amsterdam programme, the Futures talents Elena Subach and Mous Lamrabat will also show some of their work at the exhibition Woven Matters, developed by Unseen Foundation. At the Machinegebouw, the showcase presents an overview of artists combining textiles and photography within their practices. The works explore juxtapositions between the tactility of materials and the two-dimensionality of photographic images.
Throughout the four days of Unseen Amsterdam, the Futures Talents of 2019 will be invited to meet photography professionals, present their portfolios, and participate in talks and lectures.
FUTURES PROGRAMME (WESTERGASTHEATER)
THURSDAY - 19TH OF SEPT. (ONLY FOR GUESTS)
- Evening opening, with presentations of the selected artists of 2019
FRIDAY - 20TH OF SEPT.
- 10.00-17.00 - Futures Conversations: Private meetings between the 2019 Futures talents and 30 among the finest professionals in the photography field
SATURDAY - 21ST OF SEPT.
- 13.00-16.00: Panels
- Creative Europe Mobility Programme, introduced by Silvana Verdiana
- Nomadic H, a project by 2018 Futures artists collective
- Challenges in the artists' professional practice: Salvatore Vitale, Sheng Wen Lo, and Diana Scherer, moderated by Angel Luis Gonzalez, Director of PhotoIreland
- How to translate your work to a bigger audience and make it relevant: Editors of the Calvert Journal, Taco Hidde Bakker (indipendent curatora) and Bertan Selim (representing Prins Claud Fund) in conversation
SUNDAY - 22ND OF SEPT.
- 10.00-11.00: Futures meeting Fuji (only for guests)
- 11.00-12.30: Futures Partner Eurokleis at work (only for guests)
- 12.30: Goodbye moment (only for guests)
More about Unseen Amsterdam: https://amsterdam.unseenplatform.com/event