about

During our exchange studies »Advanced Visual Storytelling« at the Danish School of Media and Journalism, we heard for the first time about the concept of personal Photography. We also experienced how supportive a group can be in personal photographic researches. Since the beginning of 2016 we work together, are based in Leipzig and organise for example seminars to share our experiences with you and make new ones together with you!
In past projects in cooperation with other organizations, other artists and project managers have joined in and participants have developed their own initiatives in our field. Finally, at the end of 2021, an association was founded to give the non-profit activity a suitable legal form and to offer even more opportunities for active participation in unofficial.pictures.

A society in solidarity needs a constant exchange between its different groups, but nowadays it hardly ever happens. People stay strangers to each other or just exchange in their peer-groups. People do share what moves them politically and privately in the “social” media, but the messages and discussion remain trapped in filter bubbles. Neither does the dialogue related to society as a whole happen in the media. Many, many people don’t see themselves marginalised/not represented in the media coverage, but neither in the normality of pictures in public space. Populist paroles projecting guilt for one’s own bad situation on “the others” are booming. Discussing them is getting ever more difficult – for an exchange on eye-level often even a common language is missing, as much as the will to overcome prejudice.
We want to propose photography and film as such common languages and propose images as a way to look through the perspective of the other. In order to transform from objects on pictures into authors and to be perceived in the disputed area of images, we need visual education for all!

2021/11-2022/04 Group exhibition “Photo books – art to leaf through”. GRASSI Museum for Applied Art, Leipzig.
2021/06-07 Exhibition “A marked neighborhood.” as a satellite to the f/stop festival for photography. Villa Plagwitz, Leipzig
2020-22 Long-term workshop and exhibition “New Views for Hoyerswerda”, Kulturfabrik & Schloss, Hoyerswerda.
2021/05 Exhibition “Dangerous Object: Eisenbahnstraße” for the Art Go East Biennale. SagArt, Leipzig
2020/07 Photo newspaper “Dangerous Object: Eisenbahnstraße” Issue 2
2019/10 Youth Exchange »laboro ergo sum #2« at Circolo ArciRagazzi Gli Anni in Tasca, Terni, Italien
2019/08-09 Participation and organization of the touring exhibition »Kein schöner ____ in dieser Zeit«, 4 small towns in Saxonia
2019/05-07 Photo newspaper »Dangerous object: Eisenbahnstraße«, Leipzig
2019/04 Youth Exchange »laboro ergo sum« with Autodidaktische Initiative e.V., Leipzig
2019/02-04 Workshop »out of the box« in Stadtteilprojekt Dresdner59, Leipzig-Reudnitz
2019/01 Group exhibition »von ihnen von uns von wem« in Pöge-Haus e.V., Leipzig
2018/10-12 Workshop »How to Publish« in Pöge-Haus e.V., Leipzig-Neustadt-Neuschönefeld
2018/08-09 Workshop »sharing.unofficial.pictures« in Treibhaus e.V., Döbeln
2018/08 Seminars about racism-critical photography during volunteer services, Evangelisch–Lutherisches Missionswerk Leipzig e.V.
2018/07 Workshop »out of the box« in kunZstoffe – urbane Ideenwerkstatt e.V., Leipzig-Lindenau
2018/06 Start of the continual lab »Foto, Film & Pizza« in our own space, Leipzig-Kleinzschocher
2018/02 Zine Workshop »born to work« in the Autodidaktische Initiative e. V., Leipzig-Lindenau
2018/01 Research visit for the photo book project »appropriation / expropriation: city plaza, athens«, Greece
2017/12 Exhibition and book presentation of »The Yasmine Flight« by Fahd Aldaya in Tipi im Westwerk, Leipzig-Plagwitz
2017/11 Zine Workshop »the personal is political« in the Autodidaktische Initiative e. V., Leipzig-Lindenau
2017/11 Crash course »The documentary portrait«, Leipzig-Plagwitz
2017/10 Exhibition »now.unofficial.pictures« as part of LindeNOW art festival, Leipzig-Lindenau
2017/08 Zine Workshop »Good material for a story« in Dorf der Jugend through the Spurensuche federal programm, Grimma
2017/05 Exhibition »Topographies of Resistance« as part of Kulturelle Landpartie, Gasthof Meuchefitz/Wendland
2017/04 Start of the monthly »Idea Lab« with former workshop participants, Leipzig
2017/03 Workshop »out of the box« in krudebude e.V., Leipzig-Schönefeld
2017/01 Theory seminar »How can photography be political?« in the Autodidaktische Initiative e. V., Leipzig-Lindenau
2016/06 Film- und theatre project »MOMO« with a German as a second language class of Nachbarschaftschule, Leipzig-Lindenau
2016/04 Workshop »sharing unofficial pictures« in krudebude e.V., Leipzig-Schönefeld