Join us for Benedetta Casagrande's Open Studio, our newest resident at the FUTURES Photography Hub. Benedetta Casagrande will present her project “Recollections” as part of the FUTURES Residency.
Benedetta Casagrande is an artist, writer, and educator working with photography. Starting from a practice-based theoretical approach in the fields of ecology and critical studies, Casagrande develops a biocentric practice in which photography is used to investigate interspecies relationships and more-than-human life in times of extinction and environmental ruination.
"Recollections is an ongoing body of work which (re)collects narratives of lived encounters with other species whilst looking at photography's own entanglement in processes of environmental degradation, questioning the limits and possibilities of art practices as tools to face the multiple crises we currently inhabit"- Benedetta Casagrande
Event details
1 July 2026 | 17:30 – 20:30
Q&A 18.30
FUTURES Photography Hub, Isaac Titsinghkade 6, 1018 CA Amsterdam
Join us for a Magnum x FUTURES Artist Spotlight with Sára Kölcsey.
Sára Kölcsey will present her latest work.
About FUTURES x Magnum Artist Spotlight:
Five times a year, Magnum Learn invites a FUTURES photographer to take the spotlight in an online conversation about their artistic journey. The series connects audiences worldwide with the artist’s practice, inspirations, and the ideas behind their work.
We also hope to inspire the next generation of photographers, providing them with the opportunity to connect with fellow artists.
Details:
Online
Tuesday, 30 June
17:00 - 18:00 Amsterdam time
Free – Registration required
Join us to a special evening at the FUTURES Hub in Amsterdam with artist and filmmaker Lawrence Lek.
Lawrence Lek is an artist, filmmaker and musician whose work explores artificial intelligence, simulation and speculative futures through films, immersive installations and virtual worlds. He has become one of the leading artistic voices examining the cultural, emotional and societal implications of AI.
The evening centres on a screening of Empty Rider (2024), Lawrence Lek's latest work, followed by a conversation and Q&A with the artist. It is a unique opportunity to engage with his research and practice in an intimate setting — and to join a wider conversation about artificial intelligence, storytelling, and the futures we are already living inside.
Programme
Date: 24 June 2026
17:00 - Arrival and welcome
17:30 - Screening of Empty Rider (2024)
- Artist talk with Lawrence Lek
- Audience Q&A
- Drinks and light refreshments
Location
FUTURES Hub
Isaac Titsinghkade 6, Amsterdam
Admission is free. Places are limited - registration is required.
RSVP by 23 June.
[RSVP HERE]
During the workshop participants will learn how to make plant-based developers powered by the photoreactive properties of plants and kitchen waste, and will be introduced to the material history of photography and the basics of ecological thinking. Students will test the developers made during the workshop developing photograms where they will assemble plants, their bodies and personal objects in the darkroom to construct images of the local territory in which artificial and natural bodies meet and coexist on the photographic surface.
Materials (provided by the darkroom):
- Possibility to boil two pots on a stove (e.g. a portable electric stove and two pots)
- Vitamin C powder
- Soda crystals
- Photographic paper (new and/or expired, both are fine)
- Vinegar
- Coarse salt
- Water
- Darkroom thermometer
- I am planning to teach students to make a saline solution instead of using industrial fix,
but prints should stay in the saline solution for 24-72 hours. If students cannot come
back to pick up the work at a later date, then we would need to use IlFord Rapid Fix.
- pH test strips
- Enough enlargers for all students (one every two students should be fine)
Students should bring pen and paper, and any objects they would be curious to assemble in a photogram.
Event Details:
Time: 10:00 am - 5:30 pm (with lunch break)
MK Ateliers, Mauritskade 24, 1091 GC Amsterdam
SIGN UP HERE (5 spots available on a first-come, first-served basis)
Tudor Rhys Etchells is a visual artist who uses the photograph to challenge fictions created by legal systems. Working within such a bureaucracy in his previous role as a human rights lawyer inspires his closeness to the document and brutally mundane. Documentary photography is a medium that often fails, so parodying it as a system of constructing truth, he questions the norm of the imagined nation state.
If you’re in Riga, don’t miss the Open Studio with Tudor on 27 May in Riga.
Join us for Michaela Nagyidaiová's Open Studio, our newest resident at the FUTURES Hub. Michaela Nagyidaiová will present her project “Red Hills” as part of the FUTURES Residency.
Michaela Nagyidaiová is a Slovak visual artist based in Vienna. Her work explores the connection between landscape and memory, the transformation of Central and Eastern European environments, migration, and questions of roots.
"The forest continues to be claimed, mapped, and transformed. For centuries, woodlands in Slovakia have been shaped by the rhythms of the natural world, by the traditions and rituals of people who lived among them, and by the weight of shifting empires, wars, and political systems. With forty-one percent of the land covered in trees, the forest is more than a landscape - it's a memory, a site of ancestral practices and livelihoods." - Michaela Nagyidaiová
Event details
6 May 2026 | 17:00 – 20:00
FUTURES Photography Hub, Isaac Titsinghkade 6, 1018 CA Amsterdam
During the Open Studio, visitors will be able to explore the project on display and listen to a new soundpiece made in collaboration with a sound designer from recordings collected in the forests while making the project. The artist will also be experimenting with scents in the space, inviting visitors to explore them firsthand and note which emotions or memories each smell evokes. A talk will explore the project’s process and the research that informs it, offering insight into how the work was developed and the ideas behind it.
RSVP HERE
Need feedback on your project?
Michaela Nagyidaiová and Wanderstories invite a small group of participants (max. 8) to join an informal sharing session. This is not a traditional portfolio review, but a space for artists to bring works in progress—whether photography, video, or other media—and exchange feedback, ideas, and support.
The session is designed for those who often work alone or feel stuck in their projects, offering a collective and reflective environment. Michaela and Wanderstories will guide the conversation and hold a supportive space, facilitating an open and safe environment where everyone can contribute, listen, and explore their work together.
Who can participate?
The session is open to visual storytellers, artists, and students at any stage of their project, from early ideas to finished work.
What should I bring?
You are welcome to bring prints, objects, or simply present your work—whatever best represents your practice to the group.
EVENT DETAILS
29 April 2026 | 18:30–21:30
FUTURES Hub
Isaac Titsinghkade 6A, B, 1018 CA Amsterdam
SIGN UP HERE – free access
About Wanderstories:
Wanderstories is a peer-to-peer feedback community for photographers and visual storytellers, hosted in partnership with Fotodok Utrecht. They meet regularly to share works in progress, exchange constructive feedback, and encourage dialogue through photobooks, films, and conversations around creative practice. Wanderstories provides a supportive space to gain new perspectives and grow as a visual artist.
As part of the FUTURES Residency, we are excited to welcome Eleni Onasoglou to the Robert Capa Contemporary Photography Center (Budapest), where she is developing her project “The Silence of the Beasts.”
Eleni’s work explores memory, the constructed and fractured past, and the fragile relationship between humans and the natural world. Using a distinct black-and-white visual language, her practice moves between poetry and darkness, focusing on silent tensions, lingering traces, and elements that haunt personal and collective experience.
“The zoo is a prison with a beautiful facade. There, nature is presented to the public as safe, orderly, and sterilized. Animals are exhibited as objects of observation: creatures without their ecosystem, without purpose, without choice. I am interested in exploring the pain of their silence, the empty gaze, the patience, and the resignation.” – Eleni Onasoglou
Event Details:
Date: Friday, 24 April 2026
Time: 17:00 – 18:00
Venue: Robert Capa Contemporary Photography Center, Event Hall
Admission: Free
Language: English
Description
Please join us for a FUTURES x Magnum Artist Spotlight with Parisa Aminolahi.
Paris Aminolahi will present her first photo-book, How the Nights Can Fly, published by Huwawabooks.
How the Nights Can Fly (formerly Tehran Diary) is a long-term photographic project by Parisa Aminolahi, tracing the intimate life of her mother across Tehran and temporary reunions with her children living abroad. Begun in 2012, the work reflects on distance, migration, aging, and the quiet weight of filial love shaped by the Iranian diaspora following the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
Photographed on 35mm black-and-white film and later intervened with acrylic paint on Fuji Crystal Archive Paper Supreme, the images form a hybrid language between photography and painting. The painted gestures transform everyday moments into surreal, tactile spaces, echoing both the emotional distance between mother and child and the artist’s attempt to hold on to presence across continents.
Over time, the project became a deeply personal and therapeutic process, with the artist’s mother emerging as both subject and muse. Following her mother’s passing in 2022, the work gained a new resonance, shifting from documentation toward memory, absence, and care.
The dummy was developed under the guidance of Corinne Noordenbos and has since evolved through a new edit, concept, and title in collaboration and under the guidance of designer and publisher Roï Saade. The book is envisioned to be published by Huwawabooks, Saade’s newly founded publishing house.
Previously titled Tehran Diary, the project has received wide international recognition, including being shortlisted for the MACK First Book Award, BUP Book Award, and PHmuseum Women Photographers Grant, and has been exhibited and published extensively worldwide.
Details:
Online
Tuesday 14 April
5 - 6 pm Amsterdam time
Free – Registration required
“Metamorphosis” arrives in Turin at EXPOSED Torino Photo Festival after traveling to Prague and Rouen.
Exploring metamorphosis as a personal, social, and environmental process, the group exhibition brings together diverse visual languages that reflect the tensions shaping our time.
From 9 April to 2 June, the exhibition will be presented across six independent spaces in Turin (Italy), fostering connections between the city’s cultural venues and emerging visual artists.
The works of Claudia Amatruda (Foggia, 1995), Máté Bartha (Budapest, 1987), Benedetta Casagrande (Milan, 1993), Anna Orlowska (Opole, 1986), Ada Zielinska (Warsaw, 1989), and Yana Wernicke (Berlin, 1990) will be exhibited in the non-profit spaces Mucho Mas!, Witty Books, Almanac, Quartz Studio, Cripta747, and Jest, strengthening a network of collaboration between independent initiatives and new generations of artists in contemporary photography.