Finaliści Fotofestiwal 2022 Open Call!

The Open Program has existed as part of the festival since 2003, fostering an overview of current phenomena in photography. This year’s submissions had a very strong level of commitment. Our Jury tried to prepare a coherent and diverse selection. The projects selected by the Jury raised universal philosophical questions and depicted fundamental social issues that emerged during last years. Most of these works are not only visual narratives or illustrations, but rather a form of engagement, self-reflection, or participatory observation. Selected projects, despite their diversity, clearly refer to the problems and challenges of the present times. The extremely high level of this year’s edition resulted in the fact that we decided to choose finally seven instead of six projects.

This year, we also decided to add a category that refers to the main theme of the festival’s curatorial program – “Community”. We were looking for artistic and social projects whose main theme is local cooperation and integration. The selected project is about building a “sisters community” on new principles – non-violent, economically independent, based on mutual respect and closely related to nature.

From among 962 projects, the international jury selected works by seven artists, whose projects we will be able to see at exhibitions during the Fotofestiwal in 2022 (June 9-26, 2022). Here they are:

Santanu Dey “Brackish Tears” / India
Cemre Yeşil Gönenli “Hayal & Hakikat: A Handbook of Forgiveness and A Handbook of Punishment” / Turkey
Balázs Turós “The Nature of Things” / Hungary
Mathias de Lattre “Mother’s therapy” / France
Marina Istomina “Krysha” / Russia
Mateusz Kowalik “Devil’s Rib” / Poland

For the Community category:
Mahé Elipe “Mujeres de la tierra” / France and Mexico

We would like to thank everyone who submitted their applications – for the opportunity to see their projects. Choosing them was a difficult and complex process. Therefore we would like to address a special thanks to the Jury for the opportunity to cooperate and all the lively discussions that were part of this difficult choice.

See you in June in Lodz!