2022 Nikon-NOOR Academy Hungary

The second edition of the 2022 Nikon-NOOR Academy workshop was held from April 3 - April 7. Taking place in the Robert Capa Contemporary Photography Center in Budapest, Hungary, this iteration was guided by NOOR authors Pep Bonet, Kadir van Lohuizen and Tanya Habjouqa, and NOOR’s creative director, Stefano Carini, and projects director, Maria Goirigolzarri.

For four days, fourteen visual storytellers attended presentations by NOOR, educators and Nikon Hungary, investigated storytelling approaches, participated in peer reviews, edited projects and presented their work.

The Nikon-NOOR Academy has been made possible thanks to the generous support of Nikon Europe. Below is a selection of work shared at the workshop in Hungary.

Marton Monus | Sára Kölcsey | Marco Sacco | Nemanja Pancic | Marton Béres | Francis Farrell | Gabriela Bulisova | András Zoltai | Bahrudin Bandić | Todd Rigos | Emanuele Occhipinti | Mugur Varzariu | Sofie Puttfarken | Damian Lemański

András Zoltai

You can flood me, I’ll be here

“During my journey to India, I met the Brahmaputra, the son of God, the last great free-flowing river, with a spirit and reverence. 

In the eternal view of his floodplains, in the relentless flow of his stream, and in the people who respect and honour him, I witnessed a childhood memory I never got to know. All the missing elements from my childhood have been completed by the experiences I collected on the bank of this mighty river. ‘You can flood me, I’ll be here’ is an exploration of my encounter with a sensitive, harmonious, yet defenceless relationship of people with nature and water on the island of Majuli. 

My motivation is to photograph the issues of isolation in a physical, social, and spiritual sense and focus on how people react to the river and interact with the ever-changing environment.”

András Zoltai

András Zoltai (b.1990) is a freelance documentary photographer currently based in Budapest, Hungary. He graduated with a BSc in Marketing at Budapest Business University. After, he studied Photojournalism at the Academy of the National Association of Hungarian Journalists (MÚOSZ). His curiosity, travels, and openness laid the foundation for his world of photography. He seeks to get personally involved with his stories and is inspired by classic documentarian imagery, reshaping into his own language. He focuses on socially sensitive topics and firmly believes that visual stories can change the world. András works for various commercial and editorial assignments. 2019 is a milestone in his career; he won first place in the Hungarian Press Photo Competition with his series photographed in Armenia and was selected for the NIKON-NOOR Academy in Sofia. As a result, he began to delve even more deeply into documentary image-making, which underpins the atmosphere of his film-photographed stories. He has also won prestigious state and international scholarships for his ongoing work on climate change in India, in which he examines the environmental problems of the Brahmaputra River. He is currently working on the continuation of this story.

Francis Farrell

Borrowed Land, Borrowed Time 

Three months after the end of a brutal 45-day war that ended in defeat to Azerbaijan, the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh remain lost, confused, and in danger- as in peace as in war. Military burials continue with conveyor belt-like speed and efficiency. Having emerged from a fight for their lives, conscripted soldiers remain posted on uneasy frontlines. Families wait in exile to return to a village where houses were mistakenly burnt down. Children return to school in cities where scars of recent fighting are everywhere. One man waits helplessly for justice for his son, betrayed in the heat of war. All have lost loved ones, peace has not brought security, and with no political solution in sight, none can sleep easily.

Francis Farrell

Francis Farrell is an Australian-born, Budapest-based journalist, area specialist, and photographer specialising in the history, politics, and international relations of post-communist European and Eurasian countries, particularly Russia and Ukraine.

“I have always let my unrelenting love for the world and its stories direct his life. Having lived all over post-communist Europe, from Russia and Ukraine to Albania and finally back in my homeland of Hungary, I have fallen in love with the region and its people- warm, generous, and sincere. In Kyiv, photography found me when I first picked up an old Soviet-era rangefinder and used the camera to channel my discovery of the city. Since then, I have looked to move from the cold, bureaucratic world of geopolitics to something that better engages with the human stories behind these news headlines. In 2021, I embarked on my first major project, documenting the trials of the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh three months after the end of the 2020 war with Azerbaijan. Two weeks in the field taught me so much more about the craft of documentary photography than any amount of preparation could have.”

Sofie Puttfarken

Matrescence

"This work is the result of me trying to understand my journey of becoming a mother. The unpopular term for this phase is ‘matrescence’, the transformation of becoming a mother. It includes the physical, psychological, and emotional changes resulting in a considerable identity shift for the new mother.

A central part of this work are self-portraits - throughout different times and places, they are my vehicle for understanding the state I am in. Becoming a mother to me felt like crossing an invisible line. Confronted with societal judgement, expectations and obligations all wrapped around the idealisation of the mother role.”

Sofie Puttfarken

Sofie Puttfarken was born and raised in Germany. Working creatively was always part of understanding the world. Photography was added as a craft, with a darkroom as a playground. Which led her to study photography and photojournalism at the University of applied sciences in Hannover, BilgiUniversity Istanbul and participating in 'advanced visual storytelling' international class at DMJX Aarhus.

She has been dedicating her focus to female ranges of experience, from adolescence and the issue of catcalling to motherhood, and mostly works in a participatory way. She currently looks deep into maternal realities, aiming to contribute to a new conversation about motherhood.