June is a particularly special month for all photography lovers. For the 24th time, Łódź hosted one of the largest photography events in Poland. Fotofestiwal, the extraordinary event focusing on this medium, provided the audience with the opportunity to take a close look at both the Polish and global contemporary photography scene.
The festival is not only about exhibitions, but also accompanying events such as workshops, slide shows, and music events. But most importantly, as the festival provides an opportunity to see a lesser-known face of Łódź every year by inviting visitors to spaces that are not normally open to the public, this year, the modernist swimming pool of the YMCA Łódź served as the exhibition space. A great variety of thought-provoking, high-quality works was presented across the city, providing an opportunity to take a closer look at the language of contemporary photography, its form, and the themes dearest to the artists.
The works presented in the Main Programme section focused on the issue of systems that shape our reality, determining the way we perceive it. The artists addressed how grand historical narratives, religious beliefs, systems of power, and so on. influence our decisions, shaping the structure of reality. A variety of projects came together to expose the audience to the extent to which we are controlled, often without us even being aware of it. Here’s our selection of some memorable works from both the thoughtfully curated Main Programme and above.
Hoda Afshar, Speak The Wind – image of the invisible
Hoda Afshar, an artist of Iranian descent, invited the audience on an extraordinary visual journey to the islands in the Strait of Hormuz, located near the southern coast of Iran. With her project, consisting of photographs and a video installation, the artist documented a unique culture based on the belief in the existence of winds that possess people and can cause illness or misfortune. It is assumed that these beliefs were brought to Iran from south-east Africa via the Arab slave trade.
The artist observes a culture permeated by beliefs. While the region’s inhabitants tend to avoid discussing the exceptional power of the element, they have developed rituals that can help fight illness caused by the destructive force, while shamans possessed the ability to make contact with it. The video presented in the exhibition shows the almost unearthly landscapes of the islands, shaped over the years by the wind and the rituals performed by the shaman to the rhythm of hypnotic sounds. With the incredibly breathtaking landscapes in the background, the rituals represent something invisible, beliefs that have penetrated the culture and territory of the islands. It is an extraordinary journey, documenting an underlying sense of spirituality.
Michał Sita, History of Poland – on how an imagined view of the past is morphed into the present
Michał Sita’s anthropological insight focused on the historical spectacle Orzeł i Krzyż (Eagle and Cross) that has been organised since 2016 in Murowana Goślina, a small town located in Greater Poland. Every year, for several months, a group of volunteer actors bring to life events from the past, events of particular importance for Polish national history. The scenario of the event is quite extensive, covering events from the reception of Baptism by Mieszko I to the pontificate of Pope John Paul II. The show’s organisers were inspired by 19th-century Polish historical paintings (e.g. by Jan Matejko, Józef Chełmoński, or Artur Grottger), which shaped people’s perception of history. Sita photographed the performance not only as an observer, but also as a participant, photographing from an actor’s perspective.
The exhibition of Sita’s project during the Fotofestiwal was a colourful mosaic of photographs, like a visual game, prompting us to ask the questions: what meaning do such performances have for Polish society? What feelings do such events evoke?, What image of history does Polish society want to remember? The Polish national myth is being reinforced, but as you can see, society does not protest against it, although the consolidation of the myth also plays a big role in the creation of a specific political narrative. The project is summarised in two photobooks, the 2021 publication History of Poland. Exercise book vol. 1, and History of Poland vol.2 from 2024.
Debi Cornwall, Necessary Fictions & Model Citizens – in a post-truth world
Can you tell the difference between fiction and truth? Do you trust the images? Does fantasy become reality? Debi Cornwall, an American conceptual documentary artist, certainly piqued the interest of the Łódź audience with her photographs showing how the image of contemporary America is shaped. She has made visible the facade that is otherwise invisible. The colourful photographs explore the theme of propaganda, the illusion of reality, and manipulation. In her Necessary Fictions project, Cornwall decided to enter the normally inaccessible world of American military bases. A fictional state of “Atropia” has been created, where Afghan and Iraqi civilians employed on behalf of the US government as cultural role players help train soldiers. The US Army soldiers prepare for their missions with the help of these individuals – the refugees often recreating scenes from the wars they were fleeing; their task is to create a depiction of warfare in the real world. The surreal world, after all, is to become the new everyday reality of those waiting in line to be deployed.
Focusing on American society, the Model Citizens project tells the story of a global phenomenon present in political initiatives. Cornwall turned her lens to three different locations: American history museums, Donald Trump’s right-wing rallies, and the training of the US Customs and Border Protection. During her visits to the museums, the artist reflected on how Americans are portrayed. The narrative built there definitely highlights moments of glory, rather than avoiding the gloomier elements of history. In contrast, the scenes played out by the future Border Protection are largely based on stereotypes of those seeking to cross the border.
Observing people waiting to attend Donald Trump’s rallies before his second term (the artist was never permitted to photograph the Make America Great Again supporters as a participant in these events) showed that the atmosphere of fun present there masks the hostility present in political initiatives, making manipulation apparent. After viewing these works, one may ask the question: what does it actually mean to be a model citizen? Additionally, the audience had the opportunity to watch Pineland/Hollywood, a found footage film, showing what the effects of disturbances in distinguishing between fiction and reality can be – irreversible.
Yorgos Lanthimos, Jitter Period – off-screen
During this year’s festival, audiences not only had a unique opportunity to meet Greek director Yorgos Lanthimos, but also to get to know a different facet of his work. Lanthimos’s work as a filmmaker was introduced to Polish audiences back in 2011 at the New Horizons Film Festival, when its focus was on the Greek New Wave. Today, Lanthimos is known for more than Dogtooth, which was shown then.
Lanthimos is an artist who does not limit himself to film; few know that he also takes photographs. The Łódź exhibition, designed to remind one of a labyrinth, was a collection of photographs taken by the director, including his early works from his debut photo albums and those taken on film sets. The images on display give a new angle to Lanthimos’s narrative world, dominated by an unsettling atmosphere. It is also an interesting experience to see the known characters from a new perspective, often seemingly even more surreal than the one depicted in the film.
Jason Fulford, Lots of Lots – open metaphors
Jason Fulford, an American artist hailed as one of the most cheerful creators of the international photography scene, prepared a truly unique installation in the space of the former YMCA swimming pool. Although it is not labyrinth-like, as in the case of Lanthimos, the exhibition provided a free interplay between the presented images. The project is a reference to the 1977 publication PhotoGrids by conceptual artist Sol LeWitt, as Fulford’s primary medium of choice is photobooks – a medium allowing creation of a sequence of images, which provides a fresh look at familiar objects.
Lots Of Lots transforms the seemingly ordinary objects captured by Fulford in almost seven hundred photographs into an evocative collection of interconnected and overlapping forms. Using a 3×3 format with nine square images on each page of the book, the artist groups objects according to characteristics such as colour scheme or geometric shapes. Images we see every day that we often overlook in Fulford’s juxtapositions become beautiful and take on new meaning. An empty laundry room or a lonely park bench finds new resonance in the artist’s witty compositions, showing us existing allure amidst endless production and consumption.
The space of the YMCA swimming pool provided an opportunity to expand the exhibition – to go beyond the book. Some of the photographs were placed in non-obvious places, some formed mosaics, and others were presented during a slide show in the empty pool.
Here and there – about Polish migration to the UK
Supported by the British Council as part of the UK/Poland Season 2025, the Tu i tam (Here and there) group exhibition included artworks on Polish migration to the UK, including a collection of photographs taken by Czesław Jan Siegieda, the son of Polish immigrants. Shown to the wider audience only in 2018, two years after his mother’s death, and never shown in Poland before, it created a truly unique moment with the works of a documentary photographer who, from an early age, captured on film the life of the Polish community in the 1970s and 1980s.
Siegieda has captured traditions and customs that have remained alive even in exile. With humour and a tendency to depict absurdities, the photographer has preserved the image of a community that rebuilt its everyday life after the trauma of the Second World War. His photographic record has been recorded in the book Polska Britannica (Polish Britannica).
Hannes Jung, Men Don’t Cry – look closely at the landscape
The photos shown in the Festival’s Open Programme explored current phenomena in photography and with themes ranging from identity, roots, trauma, and myths, to photography as evidence, climate change, war conflicts, and minorities. The jury selected six artists from 1,600 submissions.
One of them was Hannes Jung, a Berlin-based artist, who focuses his work on themes of trauma, both individual and that of entire societies, alongside his interest in political movements and their influence on the structure of society. Men Don’t Cry realises the aforementioned issues close to the artist, focusing precisely on men who were sexually abused as prisoners during the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina in the 1990s. Humiliated and broken by the events of the past, they attempt to rebuild their lives, giving them structure through work. Jung has travelled to the places where the crimes took place and interviewed the men who had to face trauma and the fading memory of events.
Through his photographs and texts, the artist asks the questions: how do we live with trauma? How do we deal with it on a daily basis? Can the image of these men in society be changed? Jung points to the need to change the perception of them as survivors, indicating the great importance of recognising them as victims of violence, highlighting this topic to be worked through by society.
In addition to black-and-white photographs of men’s everyday life, the artist has also included installations consisting of photographs of landscapes and men’s statements woven into them. These serve as a metaphor for the myriad untold stories of trauma, present and waiting to surface. In terms of form, Men Don’t Cry is a documentary, though full of symbolism and even poeticism, if one can speak of poetry given such a matter.
Akshay Mahajan, People of Clay – an assemblage for identity exploration
Through his work with texts, archival material, and photography, Akshay Mahajan reveals a multilayered identity. The story told by the artist relates to the historical and cultural background of the Rajbanshis (called People of Clay, an ethnic group living mainly in northeastern India). The title of the project itself is a tribute to Pratima Barua Pandey, princess of Gauripur and the aunt of the artist’s wife. Mahajan began his artistic journey in the area, inspired by the folk songs associated with the Goalpara region, sung by his wife, Mrigayanka. These served as a map for him. In doing so, he referred to the Brahmaputra River, which has run through various terrains for centuries, is almost 400 kilometres long and weaves through China, India, and Bangladesh. The river is an extraordinary entity, combining centuries of experience and cultures.
Through creative combinations of images and texts, the artist protects the culture from oblivion. By showing an image of contemporary India as a vast complexity, layers that hide the past, traditions of regional culture, regional identities, colonial history, and religious practices, he observes how the post-colonial reality is often anchored in pre-colonial memory. Mahajan also encourages reflection on identity, pointing out its fluidity. It is constantly changing – it does not belong to the boundaries of a particular place. We are all People of Clay.
