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Artist
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Julius Schien
Julius Schien came to photography in his late 20s and studied documentary photography at Hanover University of Applied Sciences and Arts.
In his photography, he is primarily looking for answers to the question of what it means to confront Germany's political legacy and the country's right-wing continuity in the 21st century. In doing so, he aims to highlight long-forgotten stories of right-wing violence that lie beneath the surface of everyday life in seemingly sombre landscape and city portraits. His works are created on analog large format.
For three years now, he has been working on the research and realization of his long-term project »Rechtes Land«, in which he documents all the actual places where people have died through acts of right-wing violence since the German reunification.
The publication fund of the Kulturwerk Foundation supports the conception and realization of the visual archive. Furthermore, the work was awarded an Honourable Mention in the Swiss »TruePicture« funding program in 2023 and received »Best Portfolio 2024« at the Open Portfolio Walk at Deichtorhallen Hamburg. Schien is also part of the »Masterclass On Documentary Photography 2024/2025« at the PhMuseum in Bologna, Italy.
Julius lives and works in Hanover, Germany.
Rechtes Land
Since the reunification in 1990, over 200 people died because of right-wing violence in Germany. Over 200 street corners, residential buildings, and recreational areas. Over 200 fates that briefly make it into the press and of which we as a society briefly take note of and then forget again. Where are these places? Do we pass by these places day after day without being aware of their significance? Is there anything left to remind us of the victims and the crimes that often made national headlines? Or are the fates lost in everyday triviality? Julius Schien addresses these questions in his project »Rechtes Land«. He devotes himself to over three decades of right-wing
violence in Germany in order to show how deeply rooted right-wing crimes still are in Germany, creating a hitherto unique visual catalogue of these crime scenes in the process.
The empty stages take over, on which these acts of right-wing violence took place. In deserted large-format photographs and their accompanying texts, the stories of more than 200 victims of right-wing extremism are being told, in the hope of getting people to look and engage with cases of right-wing violence. Many of the
cases took place over 20, sometimes 30 years ago and are regularly missing from the collective memory of our society. It is the interlude between the photographs of these places, often trapped in their banality, and the accompanying texts that is intended to make people think and look.
The goal is to photographically document all the places where people have lost their lives to right-wing extremism since 1990 and to create a unique reference work of these fates and their locations. The intentions behind this are clear: to create a greater awareness of right-wing extremism in our society and to enter into a dialog with people who want to inform themselves. Above all of this is the recognition of those people who have lost their lives through right-wing violence.
Germany has once again an immense problem with right-wing extremism. Right-wing ideas, anti-democratic sentiments and right-wing extremist violence are once again present at all levels of our society.
It is time to take a closer look.
Florian Gatzweiler offers a sensitive exploration of the invisible mechanisms of power and masculinity within the prison system. Created in collaborative dialogue with inmates, his work Räume, die challenges existing structures and opens new perspectives on social hierarchies and violence. With remarkable visual and conceptual clarity, the portrait series makes societal orders visible and fosters critical reflection on masculinity. After graduating from Ostkreuzschule für Fotografie in Berlin in 2024, this opportunity will reinforce Florian in taking the next step in his artistic journey and further develop his practice through the exchange with other experts and artists. (Cale Garrido, Curator 9th Triennial of Photography Hamburg)
Julius Schien’s project Rechtes Land builds a comprehensive documentation of the devastating impact of right-wing violence across Germany. As the work grows, it becomes an urgent index and a mirror of race-based crime across the state, from which we must learn and reflect. His photographs, depicting the ordinary settings where these heinous acts occur, serve as a stark reminder of the disturbingly commonplace nature of murder when fueled by the normalization of racism in the national psyche. If photography has a vital role, it is indeed to make sure we remember all those whose lives are wrecked by intolerance, hatred, and violence. (Mark Sealy, Artistic Director 9th Triennial of Photography Hamburg)
The intimate portraits and landscape shots of Ksenia Ivanova’s series Between the Trees of the South Caucasus convey a sense of time frozen in place – even beyond the moment of capture. Stunningly beautiful and profoundly clear, her pictures are at the same time highly relevant: the series concludes with images of people in Georgia protesting in the streets against the new pro-Russian government. Against the backdrop of the war in Ukraine, the series raises fundamental questions about the future of regions and the consequences for those who live there. It is precisely these parallels that make Ksenia Ivanova’s documentary photography so significant. (Stephanie Bunk, Curator, Freundeskreis des Hauses der Photographie)
In My Fascist Grandpa, Laura Fiorio explores aphasia—the inability to speak about one’s own dark past—particularly in relation to colonial and imperial histories. By intertwining personal archive material with collected images from open calls and projecting them onto monumental heritage sites like Borgo Rizza, she bridges private, untold narratives with institutionalized history. Her work exposes violent pasts, challenges power structures, and brings hidden stories into the public realm. Through collaboration with communities, she fosters knowledge exchange between the powerful and the marginalized, making a vital contribution to contemporary and historical discourse. (Bettina Freimann, Project Director 9th Triennial of Photography Hamburg)
Roxana Rios explores gender identity as a performative act, in which bodily presence and photographic self-representation are shaped in non-conforming and subversive ways. Moving beyond binary roles and refusing objectifying gazes, the portrayed individuals in the ongoing portrait series FIGURE, FORM claim space to shape both themselves and their image on their own terms. Contributing to queer narratives within photographic historiography, the project seeks to reclaim selfhood, the body, and representation as acts of empowerment. The series serves as an invitation and a reference framework, envisioning bodily representations that exist outside societally and algorithmically conditioned visual regimes. (Nadine Isabelle Henrich, Curator House of Photography at Deichtorhallen Hamburg)
Selection committee:
Mark Sealy (Artistic Director 9th Triennial of Photography Hamburg 2026, Director Autograph BP)
Cale Garrido (Curator 9th Triennial of Photography Hamburg 2026)
Bettina Freimann (Project Director 9th Triennial of Photography Hamburg 2026)
Nadine Isabelle Henrich (Curator, House of Photography at Deichtorhallen Hamburg)
Stephanie Bunk (Freundeskreis des Hauses der Photographie Hamburg)