The artists nominated by
PhotoIreland is pleased to nominate five artists for 2026 to join the FUTURES Platform. A jury of three Irish and UK professionals has been invited to contribute with their expertise to the selection process: artist Eamonn Doyle, Ireland; Siân Addicott, Director, Ffotogallery, Wales; and Vivienne Gamble, Director, Stills Centre for Photography, Edinburgh. The five selected artists demonstrate an exciting diversity of contemporary practices from Ireland and the UK: Eslam Abd El Salam (NI/EG), Izabela Szczutkowska (IE/PL), Jack Moyse (UK), Thérèse Anna Rafter (IE), and Varvara Uhlik (UK/UA).
The artists navigate a variety of concerns and topics, from the personal to the universal, asking pertinent and at times uncomfortable but urgent questions, bringing contemporary issues to the fore.
Originally from Egypt, Eslam Abd El Salam is an artist based in Belfast, Northern Ireland, whose gentle but powerful work focuses on walking as a pedagogical practice. Through an intuitive visual language, Eslam's practice centres around motion and nature, while raising conversations around belonging.
Exploring similar topics around belonging and identity, Polish artist Izabela Szczutkowska, practicing and residing in Ireland, works with darkroom processes and collage. Using the recurring motifs of a body and a stone, combining analogue photography and collage, the work explores states of becoming shaped by time, environment, and uncertainty.
Asking pertinent questions, Wales artist Jack Moyse presents us with the lived disabled experience, providing insight into those marginalised in the UK. All the while, he proposes photography as a liberatory tool, using his practice to confront the oppressive systems and intrusive bureaucracy.
Irish artist Thérèse Anna Rafter investigates how Western visual culture represents the living world, particularly through institutional and museum contexts. Her work draws on institutional displays and photographic traditions to examine how relationships between humans, animals, and land are defined and upheld.
Varvara Uhlik is a Ukranian artists based in London. Uhlik amalgamates archival materials with contemporary imagery, highlighting the fragility of memory and tension with the digital. In her projects, Uhlik explores themes around Slavic and post-Soviet visuals and identities.
The artists this year represent the wealth of diversity and traditions in contemporary realities across Europe, strengthening and shaping new forms of creative expression.
Members of the jury:
Eamonn Doyle, Artist (Ireland)
Siân Addicott, Director, Ffotogallery (Wales)
Vivienne Gamble, Director, Stills Centre for Photography (Edinburgh)
