In the year 2021, the question arises more than ever what else needs to be said and done to get people aware of the advancing climate change and to provoke action. What active role can photography play in this? In a public talk show in 2020, German climate activist Carla Reemtsma (Fridays for Future, among others) formulated that it was no longer "just about the polar bear on the floe," evoking the motif of the emaciated polar bear in a shattering ice landscape that has passed into our collective visual memory. Does climate change need new images? Do the countless images that we are fed every day by the media - of devastated natural landscapes after massive oil production, of plastic islands floating wildly on the ocean or of burning forests - help us to become aware of the extent of the destruction of the natural landscape, or do they merely lead to us becoming morally "deadened" in terms of images? So if the old images somehow no longer ignite, what images do we need to take action?
Exhibition: 21st May to 30th May 2021
Kids-Workshop: Exhibition from 28th May 2021
Lectures (online) & Panel (hybrid): 25th to 29th May, stream via dringeblieben.de
Speakers: Vivian Balzerkiewitz (Greenpeace), Pauline Bünger (Fridays For Future), Solmaz Daryani (Künstlerin), Monica Alcazar-Duarte (Künstlerin), Benedikt Partenheimer (Künstler), Maria Teresa Salvati (Slideluck Editorial), Tim Wagner (Aktivist, Fotograf)
Moderation: Prasanna Oommen–Hirschberg
Location: Bahnbögen Hüttenstraße, K-Ehrenfeld
Panel Discussion May 29, 2021 with Vivian Balzerkiewitz (Greenpeace), Pauline Bünger (Fridays For Future), Tim Wagner (activist, photographer), Maria Teresa Salvati (Slideluck Editorial). Moderation: Prasanna Oommen
Artist Lecture with Monica Alcazar-Duarte and Solmaz Daryani May 25th
Artist Lectures #2 with Maria Teresa Salvati and Benedikt Partenheimer 27th May
Panel Discussion May 29, 2021 with Vivian Balzerkiewitz (Greenpeace), Pauline Bünger (Fridays For Future), Tim Wagner (activist, photographer), Maria Teresa Salvati (Slideluck Editorial). Moderation: Prasanna Oommen
The exhibition / presentation in public space
In the context of City Leaks Urban Arts Festival, the Photoszene will occupy a railroad arch at Hüttenstraße from May 21 - 30 with a presentation of 4 artistic works by Solmaz Daryani (GB/Iran), Monica Alcazar-Duarte (MEX/GB), Benedikt Partenheimer (D), Tim Wagner (D). In another archway the projection "Everything is connected" by Slideluck Editorial will be shown. The participating artists* are: Sana Ahmadizadeh (Iran), Igor Elukov (Russia), Pietro Lo Casto (Italy), Mattia Marzorati (Italy), Kaveer Rai (India), Isadora Romero (Ecuador), Michele Sibiloni (italy), Jakub Stanek (Poland), Misha Vallejo (Ecuador), Ami Vitale (United States)
"Through the Eyes of children"
Public space exhibition and workshop with kids
in cooperation with NEXT! Festival of the Young Photoszene, Slideluck Editorial and Kublaiklan
Slideluck Editorial invited the Kublaiklan collective to come up with an idea that responded to the requirement to include young children and expand the public's reach. The idea, called "Through the eyes of children", was to work with children (ages 6-10) and see what words they use to interpret the images from the "Everything is connected" campaign. The best phrases are used in the awareness campaign which will be displayed as an interactive poster campaign from 28th may on the corner of Subbelratherstr./ Hüttenstraße in Ehrenfeld. The billboards are tagged with a QR code that takes users to the website www.everythingisconnected.eu where you can learn more about the project and the images of climate change. In cooperation with the photo scene and NEXT! Festival of the Young Photoscene, a workshop with Cologne children will be realized with Klublaiklan and the Cologne artist Francesca Magistro. The children's statements as a reaction to the images of climate change will be presented in public space. Thus, the use of photography is expanded beyond the usual spaces and consumption habits.
Lectures & Panel Discussion
Artist Lectures #1: 25th May 2021, 7 pmMonica Alcazar-Duarte (Mexico / GB)
Monica Alcazar-Duarte is a British-Mexican cultural interventionist non-fiction photographer. Her way of thinking and seeing has been deeply influenced by her life as a migrant. Monica's work explores change and continually confronts the human obsession with speed, growth and a better future. Her practice is inspired by the connection of people, the need for equality, and the ever-changing world. Through her work, she presents the personal as the driving force to activate the collective. Monica uses photography, drawing, and technology to call for racial and environmental justice while challenging the seemingly neutral language of science.
"My work has gone through different stages. The point I'm at now involves finding ways to create visual representations for what is invisible." (from Photoszene Instagram Takeover)
Solmaz Daryani (Iran / GB)
Solmaz Daryani's work is best known for exploring the issues of climate change and water scarcity, focusing on people and their relationships with the environment, communities and cultures. Her project "The Eyes of Earth" was awarded the London Magnum Photos Grant in 2015, the Alexandra Boulat Fellowship in 2020, the PhotogrVphy Grant in 2018, and the FotoEvidence Book Award in 2021.
Solmaz Daryani is an Iranian documentary photographer. She is a Magnum Foundation fellow, a National Geographic Society fellow, and a member of Women Photograph and Diversify Photo.
Artist Lectures #2: 27th May 2021, 7 pm
Maria Teresa Salvati (ITA)
Maria Teresa Salvati lives in Bari (Puglia) is the editor-in-chief, writer, publisher, lecturer and personal branding consultant and independent curator. Her topics focus mainly on: Environmental, Political and Cultural issues. She is editor-in-chief and founder of Slideluck Editorial: online and offline platform for contemporary photography and multimedia that promotes social change.
EVERYTHING IS CONNECTED by Slideluck Editorial is the last biennial call that the platform launched in 2020, related to the broad theme of climate change. Slideluck Editorial launches regularly international calls that aim at promoting social change, via contemporary photography and multimedia. As a result, the ten works, chosen by an independent jury, the projects address various issues: from violent climatic events, to the community of cyber-activists in the Amazon who fight the exploitation of their lands by oil companies, to the connection between polluted air and lands on human health, to the need to safeguard biodiversity for the future of humans, animals and the Earth. The selected works are translated into multimedia and presented in various photography festivals around the world. What started as a photographic project, has evolved into a more holistic and multi-disciplinary experiment, which involves different disciplines to participate to the creation of a think-tank that researches on new ways of effective communication around the multi-faceted theme of climate change.
The selected photographers for the Everything is Connected call are: Sana Ahmadizadeh (Iran), Igor Elukov (Russia), Pietro Lo Casto (Italy), Mattia Marzorati (Italy), Kaveer Rai (India), Isadora Romero (Ecuador), Michele Sibiloni (italy), Jakub Stanek (Poland), Misha Vallejo (Ecuador), Ami Vitale (United States).
Benedikt Partenheimer (D)
Questions related to the effects of excessive global economic growth are at the center of Benedikt Partenheimer's artistic practice. For his two-part photographic project Memories of the Future, the artist traveled to Alaska to address the manifest consequences of climate change. Created in collaboration with scientists at the University of Alaska, the photographs Methane show the flame of a methane gas bubble that has formed under the ice of a frozen lake. Partenheimer's images make visible what cannot be seen with the naked eye and has such fatal consequences for the Earth's climate: the escape of greenhouse gases through the thawing of permafrost soils. (Text Sophie Haslinger / Kunsthaus Wien)
Benedikt Partenheimer studied photography at RMIT University, Melbourne and Parsons School of Design, New York. His work, internationally exhibited and awarded, critically addresses socio-economic issues and ecological transformation processes. Benedikt Partenheimer lives and works in Berlin.
Panel Discussion 29th May 2021, 6 pm
#Does climate change need new images?
with Vivian Balzerciewicz (Greenpeace), Pauline Bünger (Fridays For Future), Maria Teresa Salvati (Slideluck Editorial, Kuratorin) Tim Wagner (Fotograf u.a. Ende Gelände) // Moderation: Prasanna Oommen-Hirschberg
Vivian Balzerciewicz is the responsible photo editor at Greenpeace for the Coal and Climate campaign. Until 2019, she was the responsible photo editor at SZ am Wochenende and curated newspaper pages for six years, working with photographers on specific stories and looking for images or entire journalistic photo works.
Pauline Bünger is a climate protection activist and co-organizer of the climate/school strikes "Fridays for Future" in Germany. As press spokesperson in Cologne, she represents the movement nationwide and in the media public.
Maria Teresa Salvati lives in Bari (Puglia) is the editor-in-chief, writer, publisher, lecturer and personal branding consultant and independent curator. Her topics focus mainly on: Environmental, Political and Cultural issues. She is editor-in-chief and founder of Slideluck Editorial: online and offline platform for contemporary photography and multimedia that promotes social change.
Tim Wagner works as a freelance photojournalist and studies photojournalism and documentary photography in Hannover. His photographic focus is on the environmental movement and political protests.
Prasanna Oommen-Hirschberg is a moderator, communications consultant and author. She works with her team at the intersections of culture, cultural education, diversity, digital transformation and political communication - in NRW and nationwide. She is an active member and former board member of the New German Media Makers and was a performing artist and dance facilitator for four decades.