Editor’s Pics by Tereza Rudolf
#4 min Tereza Rudolf
20. 7. 2026
I’m putting this selection together on my phone. Every now and then, I switch to camera mode and try to photograph my children endlessly tunnelling through the sand beneath a beach umbrella. In much the same straightforward way, I’ve chosen a handful of favourite articles and artist profiles connected to themes of travel, tourism, family photography, and borders of all kinds—not just national ones. Consider this a reading and viewing list for journeys, or perhaps about journeys.
On Storytelling, Recapturing Heritage and Queering History
This is my favourite interview. It was originally published in the festival issue Uneven Terrain. The festival itself, held during the Covid year, was probably seen only by its curators and installation team, but Hana Buddeus’s conversation with Karol Radziszewski has lost none of its relevance. It remains remarkably timeless and capable of crossing borders.
Although Radziszewski deals with the rather complex subject of queer histories and communities in Eastern and Central Europe, he speaks about his projects—and about the people he encountered along the way—with humour, precision, and disarming honesty. I still find the titles of some of those projects, such as DIK Fagazine or Fag Fighters, slightly and delightfully adolescent.
Tourists of the world
One thing I particularly appreciate about Fotograf is that it regularly publishes substantial theoretical essays alongside artistic projects. I’ve chosen this text because it combines historical insight with contemporary reflections on tourism and photography, tracing their intertwined histories and shared trajectories.
Among other things, the article suggests that while early photographs from distant places satisfied a desire for travel, later tourist images began to manufacture that desire. It also reminds us of a simple truth: “Nobody wants to be a tourist.”
ANNELIES ŠTRBA – DUSTING OFF THE INNER EYE
If photographing your family occasionally makes you wonder what exactly it is that you’re doing, this beautiful profile of Swiss artist Annelies Štrba—now nearly eighty years old—may offer some answers.
Or perhaps you could follow Štrba’s own method: close your eyes as you press the shutter and allow yourself to experience the scene empathetically before capturing it. The text was written for Fotograf by Italian curator Gigliola Foschi, a remarkable figure within the field of Italian photography. Including her here is also my small attempt to swim beyond the boundaries of our local pond.
ADA ZIELIŃSKA – SEEING THE WORLD BURN
I’m not sure whether I’ve drifted too far into optimistic territory and now feel the need to look at photographs of several melted cars, or whether I’m simply trying to promote a project close to my heart.
What I do remember clearly is how deeply Ada Zielińska’s work impressed me, as well as her modesty and openness during the brief conversation that preceded this somewhat anti-touristic profile.
INSTEAD OF A PLANE TICKET, A PHOTOGRAPH FOR THE WALL
Nobody asked me to include this, but travelling costs money, after all. The cheapest expense is probably the ever-growing archive of photographs stored in the cloud. It occurred to me that, instead of adding another image to an Instagram feed, someone might appreciate something a little more tangible.
So far, I’ve chosen Václav Kopecký’s seascapes and Lenka Glisníková’s untitled purple work from Fotograf Contemporary.
Text | Tereza Rudolf
#3 min Markéta Kinterová
Editor’s Picks by Markéta Kinterová
For me, photography is above all a way of looking at the world around us. Through this lens, I have put together the following selection of five articles. I tried to reflect what interests me and, to some extent, what is currently happening in the world and worth thinking about. These are not exactly light topics, but they are all around us and should not be overlooked. I also included two of my favorite sections: shorter formats that I enjoy reading because, even in their condensed form, they capture a compelling phenomenon or perspective.
#3 min Barbora Vanická Čápová
Editor’s Picks by Barbora Vanická Čápová
Selecting only five articles from such a wealth of outstanding content required considerable effort. That is why I decided to create a thematic selection focused on the motif of the island as a parallel in broader ideas about our society: places between acceptance and exclusion. Islands evoke a sense of unexplored territory, a place that could belong to us. But there is a catch: they operate under their own rules. What from the mainland appears different or out of place may, here, find space to exist outside the usual order.
#3 min Tereza Rudolf, Ada Zielińska
Ada Zielińska – Some Men Just Want to Watch the World Burn
The contemporary tourist is either something of a cynic, a naive consumer of experiences or a constantly fleeing romantic. Ada Zielińska travels through various landscapes for her work, and her photographs contain a certain amount of both romanticism and cynicism. Naivety, in her case, was burnt up before it even approached the artist’s central motif – the automobile. The burning automobile, that is.
#4 min Tereza Rudolf, Sanaz Sohrabi
Sanaz Sohrabi – Are Images Ever Innocent?
Although it might sometimes seem that way, photographs never exist in themselves. And this is doubly true of those made by machines or for archival or documentary purposes. As the art of Sanaz Sohrabi demonstrates, images (and particularly reproduced images) are part of often unwanted testimony embedded into dense nets of relationship. In her work, the artist then untangles these threads and reweaves them into artfully crafted rugs.
#2 min Tereza Rudolf
Earthlings
Global warming is a reality we either decide to confront, or not. Experts agree that only few of us are able to conceive of ‘the climate’ with our senses, and thereby consciously experience changes in the climate. The temporality of the human being as an individual is tied much more intimately to the weather.
#4 min Tereza Rudolf, Oreet Ashery
Oreet Ashery – We Die As We Live: Repeating Chapters on Mutual Equality
For years, humor, irony and sharp critique have all been important elements in the art of Oreet Ashery, arising from her direct experience of an artist living in a multicultural environment who is originally from a more conservative background, socially and religiously speaking. However, the performative events through which Ashery imprints herself into public spaces are only one part of a complex series on dying and leaving public life, Revisiting Genesis, through which the artist expresses her position on the still overlooked and badly articulated theme of death.
#3 min Tereza Rudolf
Uneven ground
Am I strong enough to abandon the tracks I know? To terminate dysfunctional relationships? These are some of the questions Kateřina Konvalinová asks in her text – hummed to the rhythm of a pop song fading out – which serves as a goodbye letter. Whether we are changing our relationships with people or the planet, our hesitation is a symptom of fear. Fear of stepping outside our usual terrain. But the other; the unknown is found outside our usual experiences and everyday paths. The focus of this issue and this year’s Fotograf Festival is the need to overcome fear; to take the first step and search out encounters on uneven ground.
#1 min Tereza Rudolf