Alina Cherubin (she/her)
Artist statement
In my photographic work, I explore human connections, identity, and femininity. I work primarily in analog, as the slower process allows for a more conscious engagement with the moment and fosters a sense of presence. A central part of my work is the ongoing portrait project »Touch Me« in which I photograph people in their private spaces. Through travel, diverse cultural perspectives are incorporated, shaping a multifaceted image of identity and femininity.
Working Conditions
Currently, I work primarily from home, and my photographs are created while traveling. I do not currently have my own studio, which is why my work develops largely in private spaces. This makes it all the more exciting for me to showcase my artistic practice in exhibitions and to reflect on and present it outside my own four walls.
I see this as a valuable opportunity to present my current work and gain new inspiration for the further development of my photographic projects.
Work-In-Progress
In »Touch Me (Work-In-Progress)« I reveal the process behind my portrait project “Touch Me.” Writings, conversations, and travel memories offer a glimpse behind the scenes. Instead of entering the private spaces of others, I am opening up my own space for the first time.
Individual fragments narrow the distance between me and my subjects. Interpersonal connection arises not only in the moment of encounter, but also before and after — I make this expanded space visible.
Aslı Özçelik (she/her)
Artist Statement
My artistic practice primarily explores family, work, care work, migration, and the question of how social structures leave emotional and physical imprints on people. My work often draws on autobiographical experiences, family archives, or personal encounters. I am particularly interested in which stories become visible and which remain invisible. I work across media—including photography, textiles, film, and installation — and view images as something that can be altered, reworked, and reimagined.
Work In Progress
»Sıhhatler Olsun« is a photo book that lovingly explores the life story of my mother, who emigrated to Germany at the age of 20 as a guest worker from a small village in northeastern Turkey. The starting point for the work was a month we spent together during the pandemic, during which I began photographing her and rediscovering her story through images, conversations, and family archives. The work addresses migration, female invisibility, care, familial closeness, and the question of belonging.
Brigitte Dunkel (she/her)
Artist Statement
My art projects are installation-based and may incorporate performative elements—the term “cross-media” is a good way to describe this practice. Photography is a key medium within the broad spectrum of media I employ in my exhibition presentations, which often involve site-specific, theme-based spatial installations based on experimental material choices. I am committed to actively involving potential viewers in the resulting spaces to facilitate a sensory experience and avoid an overbearing sense of distance.
Work in Progress
»THE FACE« is part of my digital mobile photography project »THIS IS NOT« and was first shown in 2021 as a detailed component of the installation »POLE POSITIONS« during the Photoszene Festival, installed in a doorframe of the cinema space at the Alte Feuerwache in Cologne. Although it is a self-portrait (selfie), the photographic work is less about myself as a person and more about the “medium” as a mediator. My works are often works in progress, meaning they can change in form and content.
»THE FACE« is currently being transformed into a lightbox and will be on view from September 5 to 27, 2026, in the solo exhibition »Looking like a DAMSEL in Distress« in cooperation with 674fm Radio and the concert venue in Cologne.
Bo Bungarten (they/them)
Artist Statement
In my photographic work, I focus particularly on personal inner worlds and my own journey of self-discovery. Queer and trans* perspectives, as well as mental health, are often the center of my work. Additionally, in my work I like to combine photography with graphical elements, thereby creating new worlds.
Working Conditions
I mainly work from home and am setting up a small studio under my loft bed in my 30-square-meter apartment. Until recently, I was able to use my university’s photo studio for larger and more elaborate projects, but unfortunately that is no longer possible since I graduated.
The Studio Visits would offer me the opportunity to share my work with other creatives and facilitate an exchange.
Work in Progress
The series »NO BEFORE« understands the past not as a closed state, but as an active part of an ongoing process. Who we were, who we are, and who we want to become cannot be separated. Identity emerges in the in-between. The work is an autobiographical series that makes inner worlds visible. It focuses on queerness, trans identity, vulnerability, and self-assertion. The body functions as a vessel and expression of change and inner transformation.
Caroline Weyers (she/her)
Artist statement
I use photography in various ways and am increasingly interested in its performative qualities, which I expand upon through installative elements. At the heart of my work are perspectives on illness, particularly as they relate to bodies perceived as female and queer.
Medical discourses shape my work just as much as my engagement with archives, which I use to make historical and social processes visible.
Working Conditions
Currently, I work primarily from my two-room apartment. My dining table serves as both a workspace and a workstation, which limits spatial possibilities. My studies and free time often overlap, as creative processes extend beyond the university. Time pressure, financial uncertainty, high personal expectations, and dealing with my own illness shape my daily work routine. I am particularly interested in reflecting on processes and ways of thinking alongside finished works.
Work in Progress
»Rites of Passage« is the working title. Recently, I have come to view the archive as a space for negotiation, a place to reflect on historical processes and the blind spots of collective memory. I am particularly interested in gaps and the question of which stories become visible and which are missing. In my work, I explore images of women’s* movements and female-shaped forms of care, networking, and organizational work that often remain invisible in historical visual records.
D. M. Terblanche (all)
Artist statement
My work focuses on narrative documentary and portrait photography. For me, the portrait is an intimate space for self-reflection and engaging with my past. Photography is both personal and political to me. I explore queer identities and the unease that follows a late diagnosis of autism. In my work, I transform vulnerability into images that hover between contemplation and distortion. My influences include Nan Goldin, Ren Hang, and Jo Ractliffe.
Working Conditions
I am a local artist based in Cologne. I would like to participate in this program and present my work. I have been working with photography for more than nine years, with a focus on analog processes. I work autonomously and, as a disabled artist, with the materials available to me. This has evolved into a continuous practice that uses layers, textures, and self-portraits as an accessible form.
Work in Progress
»Housebound« is a performance piece that invites viewers into the inner workings of my self-portraiture process. It begins with photographs taken during the exhibition opening and continues with the editing of those images. In my early years, I taught myself photography while my access to the outside world was severely limited and I worked primarily from my bedroom. Under these conditions, the self-portrait initially became a form of reality check and a way to confirm to myself that I exist and possess agency.
Dániel Dömölky (he/him)
Artist statement
My autonomous photography is intuitive yet built upon conceptual structures exploring two central themes recently: One focuses on shifting the viewer’s perception with abstracting the hidden layers of our built environment that often go unnoticed. The other explores the body, mind, and nature in their raw, immediate states, in, before or after the digital era. These investigations stem from the radical disappearance of the simpler, more natural world I grew up in, and from the absurdity of trying to make sense of a world that has become increasingly elusive.
Working Conditions
We’ve recently relocated our base to Cologne with my family. I found myself in a new city, a hard-to-navigate network, which could be explored gradually, but time is precious and with 20 years of experience in architectural, theatre, and art documentation photography it is important to enter into conversation, find a creative community, receive feedback thus make rooting faster. Also this is a good opportunity to regain focused time and space for creation, recalibration for my curiosity and openness for photography again.
Work-In-Progress
The »Under the Moon« project is rooted in my search for a natural, undigitalized way of life. My night walks led to the discovery of being alone with myself beneath the enormous light of the full moon — an experience of calmness in this uncanny state of the world. I invited friends to join me, and I tried to capture both the act itself and the environment from the perspective of naturally inhabiting these raw surroundings, shedding (moon)light on the fragility and loneliness of our hyped human existence.
Galina Orlenko (she/her)
Artist statement
Artist statement
I explore identity, emotional tension, and the subtle forms of visibility and self-expression in today’s society. I am interested in how emotions are suppressed or “processed” and how these processes manifest in posture, gestures, and repetition. Using digital collage, photography, and drawing, I transform images into prints, objects, and installations. Minimalist compositions and color palettes lend psychological depth to emotional shifts.
Working Conditions
I have wanted to take part in the Photoszene-Festival for several years, because I see them as a rare opportunity for dialogue, reflection, and real artistic exchange. At the moment I do not have my own studio and I work from home, which often means creating in temporary, limited conditions rather than in a dedicated space. I have participated in several exhibitions around the world, but I have never had the chance to present my work in the city where I live, in Cologne. I have also never had the opportunity to show my work in a proper studio context or to discuss it from within an active working environment. For me, this would not only be visibility, but also a meaningful step toward developing my practice further and becoming more rooted in the local artistic community.
Work in Progress
Working title: »Undo«. Undo is a mixed-media installation exploring repetition, traces, and fragmented states of memory. A vertical sequence of repeated »Undo« commands forms a backbone that connects drawings, collages, and image fragments. The work explores processes of correction, reversal, and revision, as well as the impossibility of completely undoing lived experiences. It combines physical collage processes with digital traces, creating a space between archive, body, and memory.
Jana Bauch (she/her)
Artist Statement
In my independent photography projects, I have primarily focused on activism and protest movements. My starting point was the evictions in the Hambach Forest. I then spent over two years documenting the climate justice movement in Lützerath. Through my work, I aim to offer insights into diverse realities and ways of life and to foster accessibility in order to counteract stigmatization. In addition to portrait and documentary photography, text and film are also part of my work.
Work in Progress
»Divine – a collaboration with S3Xworkers of Cologne«
The S3Xworkers of Cologne are an activist collective and a solidarity-based platform for support, exchange, networking, and the empowerment of S3X workers. Their core philosophy is intersectional and queer-feminist. They demand the decriminalization of their profession and oppose the draft legislation of the so-called »Nordic Model« (ban on the purchase of sex). They fight against stigmatization and discrimination and aim to educate through educational work and performance.
That’s how I met them last year at a FLINTA* music and art festival. This is where the idea arose to collaborate on a spicy solidarity photo calendar designed to make their sex work as well as the bodies of queer and trans people in the sex work industry – more visible. The portraits explore kinky themes as well as political ones, such as the reinterpretation of church rituals and customs from which queer and sex workers have long been – and continue to be – excluded and attacked.
Jolie Zhilei Zhou (she/her)
Artist statement
I work with photography, writing, and artists’ books. My artistic work is rooted in daily life, constructing pathways of thought from collected fragments of everyday visual and linguistic elements. Photography for me is about how I emotionally connect to this world, and writing concerns how I observe the flow of relationships in the world. I often juxtapose these two elements to transform them into new spaces, exploring alternative ways of perceiving and reconstructing daily life to reveal the ideology in which I live.
Working Conditions
Sometimes I think, maybe I do photography because I'm too afraid of moving stuff, it seems to be easier to move. In fact, this is not true. As an artist who focuses more on the materiality of photography, I have a lot of physical experimental works piled up in my WG room and around my working table at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne. I need spaces to pin up the pairs of photos, as well as to store different kinds of papers. A physical space is an important thinking space to amplify my thoughts and see if the emotional connections of the works would work. I hope this invisible part of being a photographer could be seen.
Work in Progress
»I Vomited A Bird« is the working title. I love to stroll alone in my neighbourhood, and so, to observe my neighbours’ gardens and plants on the sidewalks. Two years ago, I started a shooting habit on them, mainly in Cologne. This series only contains the photos that were shot by my compact camera, basically at night. The forms of life and death are my main focus in this series. They are often mixed together in one scene. For a while, I kept wondering if I were invading other people’s private spheres by taking photos of ‘their’ plants; and yet, another question pops up: do plants’ lives truly belong to anyone?
Marijana Croon (she/her)
Artist statement
I’m interested in the poetry of the everyday, where small incidents sharpen into presence. I follow quiet, emotionally charged situations that seem unbound from any specific time. Working with film, I rely on a candid gaze and the chemistry of the medium to reveal those brief, unexpected shifts in reality.
Working Conditions
I’ve always wanted to become more involved in the local photography scene. I’m originally from Belgrade, a vibrant and historically hectic city, and I moved to Cologne to work as a scientist. Alongside my scientific work, I built my own darkroom, a space where I began experimenting with analogue photography. Being in my own sealed bunker of possibilities, I enjoyed reflecting on all the places where the photographs were taken and sketching out a concept for a book that was never made.
Work in Progress
»The everyday, undelivered« is the working title. I used to work with small analogue prints in a darkroom that no longer exists. That space lingers now in these prints, which appear as unwritten postcards. Each image is a brief hesitation in everyday time, without sender or receiver. Between grain, chemistry and passing figures, scenes loosen from fact and settle into half‑remembered fictions, leaving only the trace of a letter that never quite arrives.
Paulina Akbay (all Pronouns)
Artist Statement
My artistic work does not have a specific thematic focus. I explore a wide range of topics, including marginalized perspectives, feelings, and emotions, as well as larger, overarching social issues such as the environmental crisis. My subjectively situated perspective and my cross-media focus seek to engage with the spirit of the times while simultaneously making the future tangible in the here and now (without negating the past and present). This is achieved primarily through photography and film, but is supplemented by other media and methods, adapted to the specific situation.
Working Conditions
I have only a small apartment (28 sqm) and a temporary workspace at the university where I cannot carry out all my projects. The university and its facilities are therefore essential for me to be able to work.
I would love to have the opportunity to exhibit my work in a different setting. Workspaces at KHM are limited, and I am not necessarily tied to this specific location thematically, I may lose my workspace this summer.
Work in Progress
“Ruhsal” means “spiritual” in Turkish and explores various themes related to cultural practices, care, identity, and cultural belonging. Among other things, the film focuses on visits to the hamam, the female body, family relationships, and the desire to belonging.
The footage was shot on 16mm and, due to illness, was filmed over a span of three years. I am currently writing a personal text for the voice-over and collaborating with a fellow student on the sound design. The project is scheduled to be completed this fall and submitted to festivals.
Pi (dey/er)
Artist statement
My work reflects what is going on inside me, even if I don’t realize it while I’m taking the photos. Looking back, I often realize that I was exploring a particular subject precisely because it moved me. In a way, I’m always searching for myself in my work. It’s about being queer and having the courage to be myself. It’s about keeping going, even though I didn’t know where I stood or who I was. My background in psychology and social psychology helps me translate these inner processes into images. I am queer and trans, and I believe I know this because I take photographs.
Working Conditions
I rediscovered photography for myself when I realized that neither my chosen career, nor the city, nor my life plan suited me. Today I live and work in my shared apartment room. Cologne, my friends, and the cinema where I work are the first constants in my life where I feel like I’ve found my place.
Participating in the Studio Visits means giving space to my work and the themes associated with it here in Cologne, where it all came to be. I am currently unable to do this with my own financial resources.
Work in Progress
I’m tired of constantly wondering who I’m allowed to be. I just want to be. »IN THE FLOW« (2026) is about diving into masculinity and how painful it was to doubt myself all those years and not be true to myself. In the water, everything becomes easier, but I have no idea which way is up and which is down.
Who am I in a world full of male aggression, war, violence, superiority, and inferiority? I want to be a man – but still soft, vulnerable, cuddling with friends. I long for tenderness, looking into someone’s eyes. That’s what I wish for everyone.
Smiki (he/him)
Artist statement
My film photography consists mainly of snapshots of cultural
productions and events hosted by Heavy Feelings. From concerts and DJ gigs to video productions, and the occasional product shoot for Heavy Feelings merchandise. Most of Heavy Feelings’ photographic content over the past two years has been captured through my lens. Documentation has been my focus so far, but I’m very interested in shooting and directing more editorials in the future.
Working Conditions
My current working conditions mostly depend on external locations and require me to adapt. I hardly ever do any photography at home, except for the occasional self-portrait. My work has always been based on “I do what I can, with what I got.” Whether it’s the first film camera from the ’80s with a broken focus that I found in my grandmother’s attic or KVB employees asking for a filming permit. It’s always “me and my point-and-shoot” versus the circumstances.
Work in Progress
These pictures are the result of a thorough process of digging through my archive of around two-thousand film photos coming out of the last two and a half years. I tried taking multiple factors into account while selecting. Intention and feeling, aesthetic pleasure and representation of me as an artist and as a human.
Eventually I proved to myself that we are an accumulation of the people who we surround ourselves with.
Shown in pictures (not in order): Parissa Charghi, Tano Jackson, DieOttos, Mina Amiri, Gabio und Mini Phaenet, Bethlehem)
Svenja Delaney (she/her)
Artist Statement
I love observing and photographing my surroundings exactly as they authentically present themselves to me outdoors. I work primarily with analog photography in small and medium formats. This allows me to capture both fleeting, spontaneous moments and scenes that require patience to wait for. For me, everyday life is art in itself. I see small forms of beauty everywhere in everyday life, and that is how I try to capture the world: without much staging, just as it happens. What I particularly like about analog photography is that it can only be controlled to a limited extent and there is always a surprise.
Working Conditions
Although my photographic practice takes place mainly outdoors, the development, selection, post-processing, and artistic experiments require space. In my opinion, this makes available studio and work structures all the more important – places where spaces and infrastructure can be shared and exchange is possible.
Work in Progress
The photographs on display were created over the past four years. Some attempt to spontaneously capture fleeting moments. Others are closer, calmer, and the result of a longer wait. I am interested in what reveals itself in the in-between – in unremarkable situations, casual gestures, or brief lighting conditions. The images do not follow a staged setup, but rather what emerges when one remains attentive.
van Lorenz (he/him)
Artist statement
In my work, I seek out moments beyond the obvious. Rather than spectacular locations or dramatic events, I focus on the overlooked details of everyday life and the quiet beauty of urban spaces. In a world of visual overload, my photographs emphasize simplicity, tranquility, and clear structures. I view the street less as a lifestyle and more as a psychological space. My images are not merely representations, but invitations – to pause, observe, and rediscover.
Working Conditions
In my living room, surrounded by frames and large-format prints, I’m not only running out of wall space, but also increasingly struggling to keep track of my photographs. For me, images only truly come to life once they’re printed. Unlike in the digital realm, a large fine-art print demands a conscious decision: choosing a subject, engaging deeply with it, and finally, providing the space it needs to make an impact. To ensure that this effect can emerge in the best possible way, I have begun building my own frames.
Work in Progress
»Of Gray and Green« is the working title. Our cities are designed, measured, and meticulously planned. And yet, the most interesting moments arise precisely where something falls outside the grid. Between the living room and the asphalt, life grows that can only seemingly be controlled or suppressed.
This series focuses on those inconspicuous plants that exist almost unnoticed in urban spaces—and precisely because of this, they unfold a special power. The green becomes a symbol of nonconformity, hope, and the beauty of the unplanned amidst the city’s dominant gray. Keep fighting!
Yi Li (she/her)
Artist statement
I started to take photos of streets in 2014. In 2020, I got my first professional camera. Inspired by Biao Xiang’s concept of »The Nearby«, taking photos of streets is my way to connect myself with local scenes.
My photos combine photos of animals, plants, streets, ordinary artificial objects, and vague, blurred people with their shadows. There is usually little natural light or exciting moments. Rather than constructing meaning through narrative or a clearly centered subject, I am interested in the lived body – what Maurice Merleau-Ponty describes as le corps propre. To live, is to see and to be seen.
Working Conditions
Aside from photographing ordinary moments on the streets, I would also love to do portraits, but I don’t have a professional studio for that, so I usually edit my photos at home or in a café. Portraits do need better light conditions so it would be better if I could work in a professional studio. Besides, I hardly know anyone here working in a similar photographic style. I want to learn how to take portraits from other artists and how to give more exposure to my works. A community could be very helpful and meaningful for me!
Work in Progress
»As particles, strings and cubes« is the working title.
I tend to keep the clarity of my photos reducing elements into clean forms such as particles, strings or cubes, while also trying to show the authentic view I saw in the moment I press the shutter. It may appear a little bit different fromt the impressions we have every day, but it is still the neighborhood that you and I are familiar with. In this way I feel my photography is somehow like sculpture: I am not just picking a scene; rather, I uncover what I would like to see from what is nearby.
