© Maxim Shemetov
Series Winner · Open Call 2024
Maxim Shemetov
Nestled in the forests of Russia’s Kaluga region, Nikola-Lenivets is the largest land art park in Europe, blending art, architecture, and contemporary design within the natural expanse of the Ugra Nature Reserve. Founded by artist Nikolay Polissky at the turn of the 21st century, the park’s landscape features fields, rivers, forests, ravines, and remnants of ancient human settlements. Over the years, it has evolved into a hub for independent art, attracting creators and free spirits from across the former USSR and beyond. Nikola-Lenivets stands as an international “expo” of landscaping, architecture, and art in one of Russia’s most remote locations.
As societal narratives in Russia have shifted toward militarism and tradition, Nikola-Lenivets has maintained a peaceful agenda, becoming a sanctuary for a generation of Russian millennials raised with global ideals. Festivals like Archstoyanie, Maslenitsa, and Signal provide lifelines for the park’s operation and serve as small pockets of joy and freedom for thousands of visitors each year. These events blend contemporary art, electronic music, pagan traditions, and reinterpretations of the past, offering attendees a temporary escape from the conflicts of the outside world. Through his lens, the photographer captures this fragile balance, a community resisting the weight of societal change, creating moments of connection, multiculturalism, and creative expression in the heart of a transformed reality.
The Eyeshot Open Call 2024 Issue #16 is a limited-edition magazine and photographic collection, showcasing the best in street and documentary photography. Featuring winners, finalists, and honorable mentions from over 15,000 global submissions, this exclusive edition celebrates exceptional storytelling.
Eyeshot Magazine #16
The third Eyeshot Open Call, a reading of contemporary street and documentary photography across continents and approaches. Issue #16 collects six awarded works, single images and series, selected by a jury of seven photographers, editors, and curators. The works move between street observation, documentary practice, intimate portraiture, and political witness, presented as an annual reading of what photography is doing now.
NEXT EDITION
Open Call 2026
The next edition of the Eyeshot Open Call. Submissions open annually. Single images and series are welcome from photographers working in street and documentary photography.
JURY
Past Jurors
Each edition is read by a different international jury of photographers, editors, and curators. The full list of jurors who have read for Eyeshot is on the past jurors page.
OPEN CALL 2024
