FUTURES OPEN CALL 2025: METAMORPHOSIS - Unfolding stories of morphing territories

This year, the Open Call theme is: METAMORPHOSIS - Unfolding stories of morphing territories

Centuries before Darwin's theory of evolution, the poet Ovid wrote the Metamorphoses, a long narrative in verse describing shifting identities with undefined contours, narrating the life of forms passing from body to body.

Metamorphosis, the ancient poet told us, and today the contemporary philosopher Emanuele Coccia reminds us, is not just a matter of the caterpillar becoming a butterfly; it is consubstantial with being-in-the-world.

You only have to look at the example closest to home: each of us undergoes our first metamorphosis. For nine months, we are the flesh of our mother, nourished by her, growing in her, until we detach ourselves from her. Our body is an extension of hers, a recycled version in a way: on day 1 of our birth, our body already carries within it a life that preceded its existence. This same continuity easily applies to all living things. ‘What the theory of evolution shows is that every species is an extension of another, which has merely modified its external appearance. We are in ourselves a kind of assembly of different forms of life’, says Coccia.

Each body is a porous soil in which sensitive matter is exchanged and circulates; integrity and purity are thus concepts that the observation of living things quickly thwarts, and with them, that of biological identities defined by forms with immutable contours. Nomadism is also consubstantial with being-in-the-world.

One hundred years ago, between the wars, at the height of populism, nationalism and then totalitarianism, Surrealist artists called for metamorphosis - mythological, alchemical - and represented it in their works. Well-known metamorphic figures are making (re)appearances, from the Minotaur - a hybrid monster charged with embodying growing violence - to the fairy Melusine. The latter, a figure from medieval chivalric tales and a mother goddess, is invested by Surrealist artists with their desire for a greater connection with the living world. A world in which they embrace the stars, minerals, animals and plants without any hierarchical distinction. Many of their works, born of a desire to rediscover peace, open the way to a symbiotic representation, reconciling human beings with their neighbours, whoever they may be: forest, water, clouds, stones, men and women, animals.

Today, a hundred years on, more than ever, when technology is taking on an unprecedented role and increasingly directing our relationship with the world, displacing our sensitive relationship, when waters and fires are raging, when hatreds are growing and expressing themselves unvarnished, how can we restore the link with living things and make a world-with? And what if today's challenge lay in becoming aware of these “lives on board”, if augmented reality was not necessarily achieved through grafted technologies but fundamentally through these lives, all these plant, animal and mineral lives connected to our own? What if in these troubled times, as philosopher Donna Haraway suggests, we learn 'to be truly present, not as a vanishing pivot between awful or Edenic pasts and apocalyptic or salvific futures, but as mortal critters entwined in myriad unfinished configurations of places, times, matters, meanings’. And the philosopher calls on humans to compost with other species (plants, animals, microbes, machines); celebrates ‘mismatched kinships’, hoping that in troubled times we will respond collectively ‘in our insolent disparity.’

Where is metamorphosis taking place today, around you or further afield, where are you observing it, where are you imagining it?

What metamorphic stories would you like to share?

Besides the more general approaches, what are the transformational processes that characterise photography as a medium (from the development of analogue photography to the use and impact of artificial intelligence)?

Let's work together to find narratives for our metamorphic times.

What are we looking for?

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FUTURES is interested in projects in which the notion of metamorphosis is intertwined with the subjects addressed and/or the creative processes developed. We look forward to receiving a wide range of proposals: from personal stories and intimate geographies to tales from afar, from documentary approaches to experimental hybrid, and media-reflective photographic projects. We'll be looking for works that reflect a well-constructed personal approach, whether critical, speculative, utopian, fictional, poetic or even satirical; we want to represent a variety of approaches around METAMORPHOSIS with the final selection of artists. 

The curatorial team:

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Emese Mucsi (Robert Capa Contemporary Photography Center, Budapest, Hungary); Raphaëlle Stopin (Centre photographique Rouen Normandie, France), Světlana Malina (Fotograf Zone, Czech Republic). The theme was developed in close conversation with Nestan Nijaradze (artistic director and co-founder of Tbilisi Photo Festival) and Angel Luis Gonzalez and Julia Gelezova (PhotoIreland / OVER Journal).

What will selected artists receive?

• Up to twelve artists will be selected. All selected artists will be featured in a special edition of OVER Journal, the publishing partner of this year’s open call exhibition.
• Each venue will be adapting the curation to its space and select from 5 to 12 artists to be featured in its exhibition. All selected artists will be shown at least once over the duration of the touring exhibition.
• Close consultations with FUTURES' curators from the aforementioned institutions regarding the works. 
• Networking opportunities with the FUTURES member professionals invited to take part in FUTURES programming for 2025-2026.
• Each artist selected will receive 750 euros incl. VAT the first time their work is included in the group exhibition, and, if the work is included by other venues participating in the tour, 500 euros incl. VAT for each subsequent exhibition.

Who can apply?

• Artists that have been selected as FUTURES Talents by one of the member organisations in the period between 2018 and 2025. 
• Artists who have either finished projects, or projects in a stage of development, as long as they are ready for public presentation on the planned exhibition dates.

What is the judging criteria?

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Applications will be assessed by the curatorial team comprising the FUTURES member organisations Centre Photographique Rouen Normandie, Fotograf Zone, PhotoIreland, and Robert Capa Contemporary Photography Center. The committee will ensure that a multitude of perspectives are considered. Selection criteria is based on:

• Relevance and criticality of the proposal.
• Alignment with the curatorial theme of METAMORPHOSIS – please make sure the connection between your work and the theme is clear.
• Uniqueness and clarity of artistic vision.
• Complementarity between the selected works.

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What should be included in the application?

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What is the timeline?

OPEN CALL PROCESS

• Submission opening: 24 March, 2025
• ‍Submission deadline: 19 April, 2025, at 23:59 CET
• Announcement of selected artists: May, 2025

EXHIBITION

• Exhibition launch: October, 2025 in Prague, Czech Republic in collaboration with Fotograf Zone coinciding with the launch of OVER Journal FUTURES edition.
• Exhibition travels: February 2026 at Centre photographique Rouen Normandie, France
• Exhibition travels: April 2026 at Camera Torino, Italy
• Exhibition travels: 2026 at Robert Capa Contemporary Photography Center, Budapest, Hungary

*Exhibition dates are an estimation and may change.

Whom to contact?

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Contact for more information: info@futures-photography.com

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