Artist
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Laura Fiorio
Laura Fiorio is an artist working with photography, performance and relational practices. Her projects interact with archival objects, questioning the power dynamics embedded in the editing process of creating memories, their political use and their critical and transformative potential. In her practice, she facilitates collaborative narratives by addressing the entanglement between intimate and institutional histories and fosters discussion on heritage. She holds a BA in Performing Visual Arts (Venice), an MA in Art and Social Work (Berlin) and a Postgraduate Degree in Decolonizing Architecture (Stockholm). Her work was internationally exhibited and produced independently or in collaboration with institutions, including Biennale, Sale Docks (Venice/IT), CeCuT (Tijuana/MX), Shanti Road (Bangalore/IN), Festival International de Fotografia (Valparaiso/CL), ECCHR and House of the Cultures of the World (Berlin/DE). Furthermore, she has been working on social projects in prisons, refugee shelters and with homeless people in Mexico, Italy and Germany.
MY FASCIST GRANDPA
According to American historian Ann Laura Stoler, the term aphasia describes the inability to talk about one's past, especially in the context of colonial power relations.
Drawing on my family history, which is primarily related to my grandfather, who fought in the fascist army in Ethiopia, I employ participatory archival methods to deal with materials (family photographs, letters, objects, official documents) that belong to what is commonly called a "difficult heritage”. Relating the intimate to the monumental heritage site of Borgo Rizza, built in the 40s by the Entity of Colonization of the Sicilian Latifondo shifts the connection of institutional memory linking it to the personal and the affective, stressing its connection with a violent historical past, not often critically discussed. I mixed my family's narratives with those collected through informal invitations and open calls, and organized site-specific public displays of such items on the modernist architecture, activating and reworking the materials individually or in collaboration with others through workshops, exhibition and live-painting projections.
Exercises in dealing with histories that, being located in our proximity and intimate sphere of affection, reveal the normalization of ideology and oppressive systems of power among people. Making possible connections between local histories and collective memories, and bringing the discussion from a verbal to a visual level, this work problematizes my and many others' grandfathers' involvement in the fascist regime in Italy and in colonial settlements, activating and putting in connection intimate archives, proposes strategies that can lead to healing processes, collective discussions and shared counter-narratives.
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)