Photographic Encounters
With the biennial format Photographic Encounters Fotomuseum Winterthur and Christoph Merian Verlag accompany a photographer/artist in the realisation of an exhibition and a publication. The Photographic Encounters format is intended to support photographers from Switzerland or domiciled in Switzerland and enable them to present a long-term photographic project.
The key criteria for the Photographic Encounters format are the project’s artistic and conceptual approach, its contemporary relevance and the quality of the photographic imagery. The title Photographic Encounters draws on the ideas of theorist Ariella Azoulay, who describes photography as a practice composed of multiple encounters. These take place not only between the photographer and their subject(s) but also, further down the line, between the viewer and the photograph. The repeated process of looking at a picture and discussing it from different angles also opens up its scope of influence. Accordingly, events that took place at one time in front of the camera are carried on through the act of reception and recontextualisation.
The Photographic Encounters format was initiated by the Christoph Merian Foundation, enabled by the Geissmann Scholarship for Photography.
EDITION 3 (2027): GIAN PAOLO MINELLI
For the upcoming edition of Photographic Encounters, photographer Gian Paolo Minelli (born 1968, Geneva) was selected by this year’s jury: Taous Dahmani (curator/author), Oliver Bolanz (director, Christoph Merian Verlag), and Nadine Wietlisbach (director, Fotomuseum Winterthur).
Minelli lives and works in Chiasso (CH) and Buenos Aires (AR). For over two decades, his photographic work has focused intensively on the Argentine capital.
His project for Photographic Encounters explores the Buenos Aires neighbourhood of La Boca – a long-established district shaped by social tensions, poverty, drug-related challenges, gentrification, and the severe environmental stress placed on the Riachuelo River. Since 2014, Minelli has been documenting public spaces, squatted buildings, interiors, and riverbanks. He complements these documentary images with portraits and self-portraits of local residents. Through his photography, the city emerges as a fragile, constantly evolving, and at the same time unifying structure.
The Photographic Encounters format was initiated by the Christoph Merian Foundation, enabled by the Geissmann Scholarship for Photography.
NOMINATED PHOTOGRAPHERS 2025–2027
Marwan Bassiouni, Laurence Bonvin, Aline Bovard Rudaz, Nicolle Bussien, Amanda Camenisch, Philippine Chaumont, Sara De Brito Faustino, Valerie Geissbühler Pacheco, Yann Gross, Samuel Haitz,Lukas Hofmann, Thomas Julier, Daniela Kaiser, Lale Keyhani, Eden Levi Am, Tiphanie Kim Mall, Douglas Mandry, Gian Paolo Minelli, Lucas Olivet, Jenny Rova, Anna Katharina Scheidegger,
Agathe Zaerpur, Gerta Xhaferaj
EDITION 2 (2025): ESTER VONPLON
For the second edition some 40 photographers were nominated in June 2023 by ten curators, critics, experts and artists and invited to submit a dossier and an outline proposal for a photographic project.
The 2023 jury – which consists of Iris Becher, Head of Editing and Production at Christoph Merian Verlag, Yining He, author, researcher and curator, and Nadine Wietlisbach, director of Fotomuseum Winterthur – have selected a photographer: Ester Vonplon (b. 1989). She will work closely with the museum and the publisher over a period of around two years to realise an exhibition and publication. The publication is intended to offer new ways of looking at her work.
The Photographic Encounters format was initiated by the Christoph Merian Foundation, enabled by the Geissmann Scholarship for Photography.
NOMINATED PHOTOGRAPHERS 2024–2025
Yumna Al-Arashi, Camille Aleña, Florian Amoser, Deneth Piumakshi Veda Arachchige, Florian Bachmann, Dorothée Baumann, Mathieu Bernard-Reymond, Nathalie Bissig, Aladin Borioli, Cortis & Sonderegger, Giulia Essyad, Tomasz Fall, Taje Mahalia Giotto, Sabine Hess, Anya Hilfiker, Ana Hofmann, Johanna Hullár, Lauren Huret & Maria Guta, Tamara Janes, Vincent Jendly, Marvin Jumo, Judith Kakon, Monika Emmanuelle Kazi, Roman Selim Khereddine, Jason Klimatsas, Ange-Frédéric Koffi, Clément Lambelet, Jiří Makovec, Lisa Mazenauer, Yann Mingard, Anne Morgenstern, Eddy Mottaz, Thi My Lien Nguyen, Elisabeth Real, Maya Rochat, Bennett Smith, Florian Spring, Batia Suter, Anouk Tschanz, Salvatore Vitale, Ester Vonplon, Jessica Wolfelsperger
EDITION 1 (2023): ADJI DIEYE
Adji Dieye (b. 1991) was selected for the first edition of Photographic Encounters. The practice of Italian Senegalese artist, based in Zurich and Dakar, Senegal, is dedicated to the themes of postcolonialism and nation-building. From an Afro-diasporic perspective the artist examines how language and the urban landscape function in the writing of history, whose linearity becomes the focus of her critical enquiry. At the centre of Dieye’s exhibition was the video-based work Aphasia (2022), newly produced especially for Fotomuseum Winterthur during an artist residency of several months in Dakar. The work allows Afro-diasporic communities and Black identities to express themselves as living archives by giving them agency and a voice.
The Photographic Encounters format was initiated by the Christoph Merian Foundation, enabled by the Geissmann Scholarship for Photography.
NOMINATED PHOTOGRAPHERS 2022–2023
Akosua Viktoria Adu-Sanyah, Zoé Aubry, James Bantone, Mauren Brodbeck, Marie José Burki, Céline Burnand, Finn Curry, Aline D’Auria, Alexandra Dautel, De La Fuente Oscar De Franco, Nicolas Delaroche, Adji Dieye, David Favrod, Marco Frauchiger, Matthieu Gafsou, David Gagnebin-de-Bons, Cécile Hummel, Damien Juillard, Camille Kaiser, Léonie Rose Marion, Anastasia Mityukova, Noha Mokhtar, Anne Morgenstern, Simone C. Niquille, Christoph Oeschger, Ruiz Guadalupe, Hayahisa Tomiyasu, Oraib Toukan, Tara Ulman, Alicia Velazquez, Karla Hiraldo Voleau, Jiajia Zhang