The Doukhobors have left Russia since Tsar Nicholas I exiled them in the 1840s. They settled their community in remote Georgian villages among the border with Armenia and Turkey at almost 2500 meters of altitude. They are a Christian sect that believed God resides within every person, rendering the need for the church and all its trappings—icons, buildings, rituals, even priests—unnecessary. These views did not endear themselves with the Russian Orthodox Church, and in 1785, an archbishop gave them the name Doukhobors, which means “spirit wrestlers”. It was an insult, but they embraced it. They believe in a native pacifism […]

“It’s taken 10 days to come here. They torched our house, looted the domestic animals, money… everything. They killed children, man and woman like animal… they rapped woman. Don’t know why they do this. We don’t have any place to stay now; there is no existence…..” – Mohammad Alam. Rohingyas are a Muslim minority in Myanmar regarded by many Myanmar Buddhists as illegal migrants from Bangladesh. They are denied citizenship in Myanmar and have been described as the world’s most persecuted minority. Since the 1970s Rohingya refugees have been coming to Bangladesh from Myanmar. In the 1990s, more than 250,000 […]

Xinjiang, a vast land located in the northwest of China, is where I was born. It used to known as the Western Regions for hundreds and thousands of years, and is now a place where dozens of ethnic groups inhabit. ‘Jiang Nan’ in Mandarin means the south of Xinjiang, the area where this series of photographs were taken. A stretch of more than 2000 km of the Tarim River, her source begins with the ice mountain in the west. After the branches converged, she runs across the great Taklimakan Desert from west to east, flowing into the Taitema Lake. She […]

The project tries to document the personal battle between dreams and reality that face the young people in the military conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh. This conflict, still alive but forgotten by the headlines, strikes a generation that was born during the war between Armenia and Azerbaijan, just after the collapse of the Soviet Unión and the revolution of the Karabakh movement. The young people I have been following for the past months, leave their motherland for work or education. However, after a while they go back to Karabakh aiming at finding future and progress for themselves as well as to support […]

We are in Armenia, the least extended of the fifteen former Soviet Socialist republics. About thirty kilometers from Armenia’s capital city of Yerevan, and twenty from the Turkish border, sits the antiquated Metsamor nuclear power plant. Under the communist regime the region had had a strong industrial impulse, especially in the transformation of raw materials and semi-finished products, which exponentially had increased its need for energy. So, in 1969 the construction of the Oktemberyan nuclear power plant began. The plant, located in a town also called Metsamor, has long been a cause for concern for at least two reasons: It […]

Siamo molto lieti di annunciare che Johanna-Maria Fritz è la vincitrice del Reportage Photojournalism Award 2018 con il suo lavoro “Like a bird” incentrato sulla funzione del circo nei Paesi islamici. La motivazione della giuria: Per l’originalità del tema trattato, l’attività circense in tre Paesi islamici (Palestina, Afghanistan e Iran), fonte di emancipazione e di libertà. Per il suo stile caratterizzato da una notevole identità e omogeneità visiva. Per avere saputo leggere e indagare la complessità di aree di conflitto evitando ogni forma di sensazionalismo a favore di uno sguardo puntuale su un microcosmo simbolico che rivela aspetti meno raccontati […]

On the border with the Arctic Circle. Far North of Russia. 300 km from Arkhangelsk. Restricted military area of Mezen. In this hostile territory, where environmental and climatic factors make everyday life hard and strenuous, computing errors in the trajectories of satellites from Plesetsk’s Cosmodrome become an unexpected resource. About 2000 km North of the launch base, there is the area where rockets are recovered by the inhabitants. It is a quite large area where, between forests and tundra, there are about ten villages. Inhabitants of this area – who base their own survival on hunting and fishing activities – […]

“Fino a qui tutto bene” is a project that I have been working on for the last two years. “Fino a qui tutto bene” turns the famous quote, “jusqu’ici tout va bien”, from the movie “La Haine” into a positive meaning, while depicting a fluid situation, whose evolution is not known, as it is new, new like the first current wave of teenagers of second generation migrants. “Fino a qui tutto bene” investigates the identity of these teenagers, identity that is similar to the one’s of migrated teenagers from other Europan countries, but, at the same time, it is rich […]

Cheer Up Luv is a photojournalism series which documents women who have experienced sexual harassment in public. The project focuses on interviewing women about their everyday experiences, ranging from minor to serious offences and giving women a platform to speak out against normalised harassment. After interviewing the women I photograph them in a location related to their experience, i.e. A train carriage, bus stop. After the shoot, I publish all of the women’s stories and photos on my social channel @cheerupluv and website www.cheerupluv.com, which takes the form of an online gallery, and gives women from all over the world […]

Italy entered the war on June 10, 1940 , after the victory of the Germans against France , with the prospect of a blitzkrieg. However the military unpreparedness of italians leads to some serious setbacks. In 1943, in early July, the Allies landed in Sicily and begin to move up the peninsula. Also in July, fell the fascist regime and Mussolini was deposed as head of government that was entrusted to marshal Badoglio. On 8 September 1943 he signed the armistice with the Anglo-American and Italy out of the war. The king, ignominiously, fleeing for fear of retaliation by Hitler […]

The Great March of the Return began March the 30th. With this demonstration, protesters demand that Palestinian refugees and their descendants be allowed to return to what is now Israel. Organization of the protests was initiated by independent activists, and has been endorsed and supported by Hamas, as well as other major factions in the Gaza Strip. The march finished May the 15th, the Nakba Day, the “Day of Catastrophe”, the anniversary of the foundation of Israeli State. Only the last day, more than 50 people were killed and houndreds were injured with the only purpouse to fight for their […]

Estonia is the northernmost of the three Baltic States. 1.3 million people live in the country and, as a consequence of 50 years of Soviet occupation until the independence achieved through the so-called “Singing Revolution”, a quarter of them are ethnic Russians. Half of them (moreless 130,000 people) is concentrated in one single region, called Ida-Viru. This little area shares its eastern border with Russia. A very peculiar one, since it parts far more than two sovereign States: crossing the border ( granitsa, in Russian language) means to leave behind both European Union and NATO, of which Estonia is among […]

The Epitome: An epitomization of my project is almost achieved by one word which for me perfectly underlines the essence of my experience until now: contrast. When i first set out to fotograph circuses in islamic countries in sept. of 2015, i had almost only questions – no expectations. I was 20 years young and in desperate need of answers. How did circus in an islamic world function? What was the essence of circus? Was it to entertain, to rebel or to combine? Until Now: Over time i found out that the obvious answer wasn’t a simple one. After travelling […]

The project tells about the different ways of Resistance of the indigenous people in the Ecuadorian Amazon who are threatened by the ongoing concessions for foreign companies for extraction activities. The extractive activities would not only destroy the jungle, they would also deprive the natives of their lands as well as their identities and traditions. The Shuar and Achuar territories are rich in copper and gold; more in the north, in the province of Pastaza y Orellana where Sáparas and Kichwas live, the threat comes from the extraction of oil. The concept of territorial identity and control of the lands, […]

“ I realised that one can disconnect the idea of a relation with the idea of having a child. A relation has no age limit, one could meet a life partner regardless of age. Once I understood that, I no longer felt stressed about finding a partner first or to settle for second best in order to have my child.” Sofia, mother of Greta (born after one insemination at Stork kliniken in Copenhagen, Denmark) In 1972, the Swedish government launched a new manifesto called: The family in the future. It underlined the importance of individualism and independence, it’s motto that […]

In recent years, Belgium has been a land of terrorist attacks. Laachraoui and Abrini, responsible for the attack in the Brussels airport in 2016, they were resident in Brussels. Oussama Z, killed in June 2017 by law enforcement while he was trying to trigger a bomb in the Central Station, he lived in Molenbeek. Ayaanle, who attacked two soldiers near the Grand Place in August, he came from Bruges. Furthermore, from 2012 to today between Brussels and Antwerp nearly 500 “foreign fighters” have left for Syria and Iraq. The terrorist threat that rages in Belgium is endemic and it is […]

The valley of Kashmir, a territory disputed by India and Pakistan since 1947, is one of the most militarized zones in the world. In 2010 the Indian government provided the security forces deployed in the state of Jammu and Kashmir with a new weapon. Shotgun shells fled with hundreds of small lead pellets are since then used to keep urban protests under control. Heavily used during the anti-indian uprising in 2016, according to Amnesty International, the new weapon is responsible for blinding hundreds and killing dozens. Left partially or totally blind, victims speak of the darkness descended upon their lives. […]

First time I visited the Donbass region was at the beginning of summer of 2014, right at the beginning of the military conflict. Nobody knew at that time how long this conflict would last, and how difficult and painful the consequences of this conflict would be. People of Donbass truly hoped the war would end quickly, and peace would come back to their long-suffering land. Three years went by. The active phase of the conflict is over, but there is no peace yet. With this war, hearts of people were filled with uncertainty, despair, and complete luck of hope. Along […]

Even when being in the tree tops, the permanent noise of the diggers can’t be unheard. Day and night. They are moving closer and closer, to further enlarge the lignite mine of Hambach. Between the trees and the pit, there is a zone of maybe 200 meters. Here, the forest has already been cleared, it is the border between nature and ecological destruction, the no man’s land. Together with the neighbouring open pit mines Garzweiler and Inden, Hambach forms Europe’s largest source of CO2 emissions. Everything must give way to the mine: not only the trees of the Hambacher Forst, […]

Outside the Church it’s still cold. Dawn has the colours of the rainbow, but inside is hell.                       Sergio remains beautiful, blond and impassive when confronted by the curse of the priest: “For you, there is no place in Heaven”. Four years ago I witnessed this curse against Sergio by a young priest. Sergio belongs to one of the 30 LGBT believers group in Italy, offering spiritual assistance paths to all people with different sexual and gender identities from the one accepted by the Church. The greatest dilemma for a believer is to question whether he/she is living in sin. In […]

Jiu Valley is my latest series on of the last surviving bastion of the Romanian mining industry. The valley stretches along the Southern Carpathian Mountains and has been heavily industrialized in it’s over 40 years of communism. The factory workers and the miners were the country’s pride, idealized and portrayed as heroes. By 1979 the mines were employing over 179,000 miners. Now they’re under 10,000. In 2018 there are still 5 active mines, but outdated technology, poor conditions and strict EU limits forces the mines to shut down by the end of the year. Everything in the Jiu Valley’s towns […]

Since the end of June 2016, the new President Rodrigo Duterte has started a war on drugs, involving all the parties from consumers to dealers. This issue has been a key point of his campaign, vowing to stamp out the problem within six months. More than 12,000 filipinos have been killed by the Police and self-proclaimed groups of vigilantes, and the wave of killings shows no sign of subsiding. At night, armed squads of vigilantes go around targeting drug dealers and addicts. After having executed them, they leave on the scene a handwritten sign indicating the crime committed by the […]

The project is about a young generation of the Russian protest movement, about the difficult issues that young people are forced to deal with when they go to the streets. The project consists of the series of single portraits. Photos are accompanied by a small text from the first person of each participant. “Against” A new surge of protest activity covered almost all regions of Russia in 2017. Tens of thousands of people came to the streets under the slogans “Against corruption” on March 26 and June 12. Organized by opposition politician leader Alexei Navalny, protest actions were held in […]

Moldova was part of the Soviet Union. Today, it is an independent country with a pro-Russia self-declared Transnistrian region in the East, an autonomous Turkish-speaking Gagauzian province in the South, a border to Ukraine to the North, one to Romania and the EU to the West. Photographing the Moldovan national football landscape is about showing daily life in a nation looking for normality, while building new identities on its controversial past and present. The stadium is a space where identities are outed, reflecting the outside society with conflicts at times acerbated. The football national landscape provides a centre around which […]

fu|ture kids [ˈfjuːtʃɐ kɪdz]: 1. expression of hope 2. positive vision of a mulitilingual, multiethnic generation We live in a world, in which national identities are not easily distinguishable. Where people move from one place to another. At the same time nationalism is on the raise again and more people than ever are on the flight. What happens after one generation, when people settle in a new country, in a new culture? An exploration of the lives and identity of four young individuals through essayistic portraits, photographed from summer 2016 to summer 2017 in Berlin. Leila, Ilhan, Mohammed and Coco […]