© Florian Czech/Festival La Gacilly-Baden Photo
Unique Photo Summit with 36 photographers from 16 countries and 91 journalists. Under the title World.Nature.Heritage, the state of our environment was discussed in numerous lectures and workshops from 23 – 25 August 2024 on the occasion of the 185th birthday of photography.
‘There will probably never be another world-class line-up like this in Austria – at least not as long as I live,’ says festival director Lois Lammerhuber, enthusiastically summarising the Media Days 2024. The photography elite of our generation has come together in Baden and turned the Long Night of Photography and the Photo Walk through the festival’s exhibitions into a unique event in Austria’s photographic history.
Yasuyoshi Chiba travelled from Jakarta, Beth Moon from San Francisco, Nazli Abbaspour from Tehran, Cassio Vasconcellos and Lucas Lenci came from Sao Paulo, Brent Stirton and George Steinmetz from Los Angeles, Alain Schroeder from New York, Jennifer Hayes and David Doubilet from Manila.
But the 91 journalists from Stern and NZZ to Le Figaro Magazine and GEO, from ORF Fernsehen to derStandard and Ö1 Morgenjournal also represented the Who’s Who of the European media landscape. They were joined by museum directors such as Vaclav Macek from Bratislava or Michael Jung from the Hans Hass Archive in Merzig-Weiler or Andréa Holzherr as a representative of the most important photo agency in the world, Magnum in Paris. La Gacilly was represented by Eric Vaucelle and the city of Baden by Mayor Stefan Szirucsek.
Jennifer Hayes and David Doubilet made a stirring plea to save the oceans as part of the ‘Long Night of Photography’ at the Cinema Paradiso, which was packed to the last seat. The documentary film producer couple Anita and Richard Ladkani, based in Baden, relentlessly reported on the struggle of the indigenous population of the Amazon region against the approximately 20,000 illegally operating floating gold panning plants, which use highly toxic mercury to extract one gram of gold per hour from one hectare of Amazon riverbed soil. Scenarios like in a war.
The third topic of the evening was dedicated to the viral disease me/cfs, a disease that affects a good 80,000 people in Austria and which medicine and society are still quite helpless in the face of. The we&me Foundation, founded by Gabriele and Gerhard Ströck, is endeavouring to better inform the public with major awareness campaigns and to persuade politicians to act more quickly. A photo project initiated together with the festival – designed by one of the best photographers of our time, the South African Brent Stirton, and the Minister of Health during the 2020/2021 pandemic, Rudi Anschober – aims to contribute to this.
The Thomas Jorda Award, which is presented annually to young Lower Austrian women writers by the NÖN editorial team in memory of the festival’s founding member Thomas Jorda, went to Elisabeth Steinkellner this year.
The presentation of the Hans Hass Awards to Jennifer Hayes and David Doubilet was also celebrated during the ‘Long Night of Photography’.
The Lammerhuber Award, donated by Silvia and Lois Lammerhuber, honoured the British photographer Martin Parr was honoured for his life’s work. Standing ovations! ‘These were tremendous hours with wonderful people and incredible life achievements,’ said Gisela Kayser, long-time Artistic Director of the Friends of the Willy Brandt House in Berlin.
The media day began at 9 a.m. in the festival hotel At The Park with presentations by the medical director of Badener Hof Kerstin Klimt and the hotel’s managing director Alexander Walter-Frosch, who were able to inspire the audience with their explanations of the healing powers of Baden’s sulphur water.
At 12.30 pm, the almost 200-strong entourage of photographers, journalists and sponsors set off on an 8(!) hour tour of all the exhibitions. The 31 Artist Talks were introduced by a lecture by Tyrolean scientist and photographer Norbert Span, who specialises in capturing and photographing snow crystals after their 2,000-metre journey in his studio on the Brenner Pass. A marvellous world.
No less inspiring were the stories about the genesis of the winning photos in the world’s largest photo competition with around 600,000 entries, organised by CEWE and presented by Head of Marketing Austria Michael Pollaschak and jury members Ulla Lohmann and Lois Lammerhuber.
The programme of speakers began to unfold and was to last 8 hours: Markus Eisl, Luigi Caputo, Martin Parr, Christian Schörg, Ina Künne, Pulitzer Prize winner David Turnley, Cassio Vasconcellos, Pascal Maitre. Sascha Goldberger was represented by meteorite researcher Christian Köberl. He was followed by Lucas Lenci, Richard Ladkani and Evelyn Lynam Ruiz.
© Festival La Gacilly-Baden Photo
Sebastião Salgado was represented by Cyril Drouhet, Director of Photography at Le Figaro Magazine, and Jennifer Hayes & David Doubilet were represented by Seacam founder Harald Hordosch and his daughter Esther Böhmer, whose company in Voitsberg produces the best underwater housings in the world. Brent Stirton, together with scientist Pia Parolin, explained the threatening environmental developments in the Pantanal. Alain Schröder described in touching words the world of our closest relatives – the orangutans in Indonesia – which are threatened with extinction, Lorraine Turci, Nazli Abbaspour – who gave her presentation in her native language Farsi, Beth Moon spoke about the magic of the giant trees of our world, Yasuyoshi Chiba, Nadia Ferroukhi and last but not least the Australian Vee Speers.
The visit by Federal Minister Leonore Gewessler, accompanied by Deputy Mayor Helga Krismer, rounded off the afternoon, as did the several hours of filming by ORF Lower Austria.
A fascinating afternoon full of empathy, knowledge, inspiration, solidarity and respect. Brigitte and Heiner Henninges from Das FotoPortal: ‘Three wonderful, exciting and thrilling days. We enjoyed every minute and we will certainly never forget the many different impressions: Exhibitions and the communication of photography could not have been better. We are happy to be part of this photographic family and hope that we will find enough words to honour the La Gacilly-Baden Photo Festival in our coverage’.
