FRESH EYE – Budapest, Wien, Belgrade street photography
The exhibition dedicated to the street photography presents the winners of FRESH EYE contest, that was open to photographers from three countries: Austria, Hungary and Serbia, respectively. The aim of this project, that enfolder thoughout the summer of 2024, was was to explore urban landscape and capture the moments in day-to-day street life in Budapest, Vienna and Belgrade, creating their own vision.
How do photographers experience the city? What is a fresh environment in their eyes?
What is it that makes a city special? What do they have in common? The answers are found in a colorful selection of contemporary life, history, culture, common values, as well as differences, characterising these metropolises and their inhabitants, that create a complete picture of spectacular citiyscape.
The project was initiated by the Budapest PhotoFestival and realized in partnership with Austrian Cultural Forum Budapest, Collegium Hungaricum Vienna, Collegium Hungaricum Belgrade and Austrian Cultural Forum Belgrade, in cooperation with Foto Wien – Festival & Belgrade Photo Month.
Dénes Erdős (HU), Veronika Fekete (HU), Lukas Felder (A), Gerhard
Wimmer-Etz (A), Mitar Mitrovic (SR) Nađa Repman (SR).
pon/Mon – sub/Sat 9 – 22h
The project, An Enlightening Journey, celebrates the resilience and strength of students from the FLS (French as a Schooling Language) program at J.B.
Corot High School. These students, often arriving alone after traumatic journeys, face numerous challenges integrating into French society. The project’s aim is to combat discrimination by highlighting their unique stories through an artistic series that includes portraits, video interviews, and texts. These students, overcoming language barriers and past traumas, showcase their journeys of hope and perseverance.
The program, essential for their integration, helps students progress into vocational training and find better job opportunities. The project brings together former students, now financially independent and settled, with current students aiming for certification (C.A.P or BAC PRO). It fosters connections, offering a platform for interaction both online and in-person
during exhibitions and meet-ups.
Photographic portraits provide a way for these young people, who often struggle with verbal expression due to cultural differences, trauma and language barriers, to tell their stories. This initiative also addresses the challenges of learning French amid migration-related difficulties. Concerning the photographic part of the project, the artistic vision is led by Juliette de Cuzey, a self-taught French photographer whose work has mainly been focused on underrepresented communities.
uto/Tue – pet/Fri 13 – 19h
sub/Sat 10 – 15h
How does one discover more about oneself? For me, art has always been the answer.
For a long time, I struggled with one question – why did I feel the need to destroy the feminine within myself? It was never about the rejection of femininity in the world, but about fighting it within me. I believed it made me weak, something that I needed to suppress. But the struggle became so intense that I didn’t even know who I was anymore.
The feminine did not remain quiet – it fought back, attacking my masculine side. The war inside me left me forlorn, unable to recognize either side of myself. I thought I had to win, but I realized that the way out was not in victory or defeat – it was in understanding.
I am both.
This exhibition is a reflection of that journey. Every photograph is a selfportrait – a visual representation of that internal struggle and of the moment of acceptance.
On a larger scale, this struggle mirrors what society often imposes. Toxic masculinity exists because we are taught to suffocate our feminine side. We are raised to reject softness, emotions, and vulnerability. But strength is not about picking sides – it’s about embracing the balance we all carry within us.
@vukasin_cvetkovic
pon/Mon – sub/Sat 14 – 20h
The exhibition presents books by authors published under the curatorship of the Book[e]lab platform. Book[e]lab works at the intersection of contemporary art and photobook design, focusing on limited-edition artist’s books. Each project combines visual narrative with material form, where content and design come together to create a cohesive artistic statement. The platform encourages experimentation, exploring the connection between image, structure, and tactility, and challenging traditional ideas of what a book can be. By collaborating with artists, photographers, designers, as well as paper manufacturers and printing technologists, it creates an environment for dialogue and innovation.
This exhibition features a selection of artist’s books where the concept is not just presented but physically embodied in the book’s structure and design. Each book acts as an independent piece, where content and form are closely integrated into a unified artistic expression.
Alongside the exhibition, a series of workshops and discussions will offer a space for dialogue, bringing together everyone involved in the photobook creation process. The goal is to encourage an exchange of ideas, exploring the book as both an artistic medium and a tangible expression of the author’s vision.
Artists: Sveta Kaverina, Gulshat Gubaidullina, Anya Belka, Elina Gusarova, Alexey Belov, Veronika Trubnikova, Katerina Kouzmitcheva, Valeria Kruglova, Natalia Ershova, Anastasia Saut, Sophie Pankevich, Marta Ladokhina, Lena Weinstein, Dmitry Pechurin, Irina Kravchina, Liza Tolstyakova, Vlad Iakubovski,
Dmitry Pyatnitsky, Sasha Fedulova and others.
bookelab.com • @bookelab
Thu – Sun 16 – 22h
Night portraits on the trees – fragile crooked figures, resembling animals or creatures which used to be alive. The bodies are in a state of suspended motion in an attempt to climb the top of the tree, dissolving into synthetic light.
These images remount us to the animalistic samblance or images of Adam and Eve, being in search of the forbidden fruit.
Nudity in European culture is inseparable from the theological symbolism. Before the fall of man, people didn`t know about their nakedness, their bodies were covered with grace. Modern Adam and Eve move through the trees in search of the forbidden fruit, wanting to return to paradise, to find the lost.
Such escapism can easily be compared with the anabiosis of an animal: the slowing down of body life processes under the influence of the manifestation of aggressiveness of the external environment. This explains the similarity of nude figures with animals.
The faces of people are hidden. In modern culture there is an asymmetry between the face and the body: the face is always naked, the body is always hidden. The face is the most strong means of expression. Nude figures on trees turn the conventional framework upside down.
Despite their nakedness, the figures don`t try to seduce the viewer, they rather express the desire to defend themselves up to the manifestation of aggression, to wait out.
These images can be compared with a depressed state, an awareness of their powerlessness – the inability to influence or participate in the ongoing global processes.
pet/Fri 17 – 20h
sub/Sat – ned/Sun 15 – 18h
Broken Shadow is a collection of silver prints exploring the interplay between shadow and light in the context of human experience. By delving into how we relate to ourselves, our past, and our environment, this work engages with the complexity and conflicts of our inner worlds. Childhood memories, hopes, fears, sexuality, and dreams form the fabric of the exploration.
Broken Shadow addresses the tension between what we confront and what we leave in the shadows. Just as in life, the work explores the contrast between darkness and light, the familiar and the unknown, embracing the challenge of unearthing what lies beneath the surface while reflecting the enduring need for light in dark times.
The series invites viewers to patiently consider the complexity of their inner worlds, offering a glimpse into how personal experiences shape our understanding of reality. In today’s world, where darkness threatens and challenges may feel overwhelming, Broken Shadow offers a sense of hope.
It is an invitation to uncover the hidden beauty within, a call to confront our blind spots, and an opportunity to practice the art of seeing beyond the surface. By bringing these fragments into the light, we can cultivate a deeper understanding —of both ourselves and the world around us.
This exhibition has been made possible with the essential support of the Embassy of Norway in Serbia.
oyvindhjelmen.com • @hjelmenoyvind
sre/Wed – pon/Mon 16 – 20h
In my black and white works, I mainly work intuitively and instinctively, and images are often triggered by objects, memories and experiences, – real or imagined.
I try to explore relations in life through dreamlike re-visitations of a childhood’s play-scapes, escaping into other worlds. Known – and yet unknown.
This exhibition has been made possible with the essential support of the Embassy of Norway in Serbia.
Wed – Mon 16 – 20h
David Salcedo consigue llevar la “fotografía de calle” a otro nivel, cuestionando los límites de la narrativa visual mediante una edición abierta que pone en valor la capacidad de interacción del lector, mostrando así que el verdadero acto creativo es su proceso de trabajo.
Como su nombre indica, + es el resultado de una suma, un trabajo cuyas escenas, a priori inconexas, dialogan entre sí desde el misterio y la poética del azar para generar una y otra vez nuevas y sorprendentes interpretaciones.
Una gota + una gota no son dos gotas,
es una gota más grande que está hablando del mar.
Álex Llovet
***
David Salcedo takes “street photography” to another level, questioning the boundaries of visual narrative through an open-ended editing approach that highlights the reader’s ability to interact, thus revealing that the true creative act lies in his working process.
As its name suggests, + is the result of an accumulation—a body of work whose seemingly disconnected scenes engage in a dialogue shaped by mystery and the poetics of chance, continually generating new and surprising interpretations.
A drop plus a drop does not make two drops;
it is a larger drop speaking of the sea.
Alex Llovet
davidsalcedo.es • @david_salcedo_
Curated by Ana Šćepanović.
In 2023, Delphine Schacher, Swiss photographer was given carte blanche by « Palp festival » (Valais) on the theme of funeral rites. Delphine decided to collaborate with a small group of « Val de Bagnes » residents who had lost a loved one and wished to honor their memory through a creative process.
Using archival photographs chosen by the residents, they created portraits using the cyanotype technique. This is one of the oldest non-silver monochrome processes, dating back to the middle of the 19th century and enabling us to create an image using sunlight. Today’s mountain flowers are superimposed on images of vanished lives.
Like memory inscribed in time, the flowers leave their imprint on these memories of a time gone by, evoking both the delicacy of maintaining memories and the strength of the cycle of life. This collaborative, contemporary creation takes the form of a “Garden of Remembrance”, sprouting organic portraits honoring the deceased in the world of the living.
This exhibition was made possible thanks to the Swiss Embassy in Belgrade.
delphineschacher.com • @delphineschacher
Mon – Sat 14 – 20h
These photographs begin where control ends. Abandoned cars sink into the snow, walls crumble under the wind. Things made by human hands once seemed perfect and solid — artifacts of presence, markers of a claimed space — yet they slowly lose their shape, merging into the surroundings.
I watch as the landscape takes what people left behind and makes it its own.
This is not a struggle – what was brought here quietly dissolves into what has always been.
Here, it’s not an invasion of nature by man, but something else: where we sought to subdue, it absorbs. It does not live, as we understand life; it simply is.
andreysemenov.com •@andrew.semenov
Mon – Sun 10 – 20h
* Galleries and exhibition spaces retain the right to change the date and time of the exhibitions and other events
