Pop-up Fotofestival
From November 21 – 30, 2024, around 6,000 guests visited our festival with over 30 projects, 14 lectures and discussions, as well as 4 workshops on topics such as photojournalism, documentary and street photography, media literacy, artificial intelligence and FakeNews. More than 50 photographers were involved in the exhibition and supporting program.
Online community for photojournalism
Development of an international community and publication platform for photojournalism and documentary photography.
We need more journalistic formats that reach their audience emotionally. On all channels, whether on the web, on paper, on social media or live on site. Formats in which people can participate and get involved and in which their living environment and everyday life are brought into focus and in which the connections are explained in a simple and catchy way.
We are building a steadily growing community through our shared passion for high-quality documentary photography and photojournalism. We arouse a fundamental interest in journalistic content through individually tailored added value around the topic of photography.
Quality seal for the authenticity of images
We are a member of the international Content Authenticity Initiative and, together with important photojournalistic institutions such as World Press Photo, VII Foundation, Magnum Photos, Photography Ethics Centre, National Press Photographers Association and the Syndicat des Agences de Presse Photographiques, we support the Statement of Principles of the “Writing with Light” initiative.
Think tank “Visual solutions for science communication”
We are experts in visual storytelling. We can help translate complex topics into accessible language. The language of images. This is because it has an emotional impact, appeals to people more directly, arouses interest, sensitizes and quickly opens up discourse. We can be the “warm-up” for the start of effective and sustainable communication.
We want to make abstract or complex topics such as climate change or sustainability tangible and communicate them effectively. Based on our special focus on authentic documentary photography, we are developing a unique concept for a new form of scientific photography and are building up a pool of experts for this purpose.
We do not simply illustrate problems, symptoms or solutions. We bring things into the world that have never existed before. Because our photographers are already asking the question visually. Using this approach, they find new documentary or artistic answers that sensitize and open the audience to a topic.
The right format is considered right from the start, because visual formats are like a warm-up BEFORE entering into the complexity of facts and forecasts.
Whether lectures, discussion events, workshops, books, exhibitions, mobile photo events, social media or out-of-home campaigns, our projects and formats work like translators. Using the medium of photography, they interpret scientific facts and contexts beyond a cognitive level in such a way that they reach a broad and often uneducated audience on an emotional level.
As part of cooperation projects with scientific institutions and journalists, we want to further develop this concept and make a significant contribution to effective climate and sustainability communication.
Feel free to contact us so that together we can develop the right concept for you that will help your scientific work and your content to have more impact.
Media competence workshops
Project days, workshops and tutorials on media skills in schools and teacher training.
The project, which runs until 2026, aims to develop special media education training courses for teachers and multipliers using a train-the-trainer concept.
The aim is to enable teachers to teach young people how to use (journalistic) photography confidently and critically.
Jugend fotografiert Deutschland
In May 2025, the award ceremony for the “Jugend fotografiert Deutschland” competition will take place in Hamburg under the motto “Be you. Be seen. Be heard.” will take place in Hamburg in May 2025.
Until March 30, 2025, we are inviting young people from as many different social groups as possible aged between 10 and 18 to submit photo stories on a topic relevant to them. It is a new and particularly low-threshold journalistic format that promotes young people’s media skills and enables them to voice their concerns through their own actions. This motivates them to engage with new topics and opinions and to enter into an effective dialog with others.
The topic is open. The competition enables young people to put the idea of “living democracy” into practice. For the competition, a documentary photo series is to be created that represents a personal concern of the young people and points out a problem or a particularly positive aspect in the reality of their lives. Through this creative form of participation, young people can raise their voices and draw attention to social issues.
Tracing the Possible – from July 2025 in Arles
Around 150,000 guests visit the “Les Rencontres de la Photographie d’Arles” photography festival every year – one of the most renowned photography festivals in the world.
For the three-month duration of the festival, 7 laif photographers will be exhibiting works on the theme of “Utopia” at the Fondation Manuel Riviera-Ortiz.
The Line Between Us – Positions in queer photography
From August to October 2025 at Galerie Nord in Berlin.
The exhibition project focuses on the question of the extent to which photography can influence processes of social change and how the selected photographic positions can provide answers through their conception.
BildBotschaft Hamburg – Encounters and participation through photography
Photos have superpowers. They reach us immediately and get us talking to each other. We want to use these powers to bring different people in our society together. To this end, we will gradually open BildBotschaften in various cities from fall 2025. We are starting with our pilot project for local photojournalism in Hamburg.