© Chiara Indelicato
Widening the Gaze through Seawater
Book launch / conversations on ocean x photography
14 November 2026, 11:00–13:00
Atelier Néerlandais, 22 Avenue Victoria, Paris
Please register HERE.
Tom Viaene
20 okt 2026 • 2 min
During Paris Photo 2026, FOTODOK and TRIGGER (FOMU’s book series) join forces to present a conversation around TRIGGER #7: Ocean, a publication that reorients photography toward the sea. Guest-edited by Oceanographies Collective and designed by Fw:Books, the book explores: What happens when the ocean, rather than land, becomes photography’s point of departure?
This discussion brings together contributors to TRIGGER #7: Ocean and artists from FOTODOK’s group exhibition A Wider Gaze, including among others, Julia Gat and Maite Vanhellemont. Aldeide Delgado will address the Caribbean as a critical oceanic framework and introduce the 2027 WOPHA Congress.
Together, they explore how photography can decenter land-based perspectives, attune to the ocean’s movements, and respond to its ecological, political, and mnemonic depths.
Book cover based on Travis Brandwood image from baby jellyfish.
Design by Hans Gremmen.
The conversation is moderated by Nuria Bofarull (guest-editor Trigger #7; Ocean), and unfolds through three thematic currents:
- Widening the gaze through seawater: Immersion, underwater optics, and alternative processes, such as Chiara Indelicato’s coffee-and-seawater darkroom techniques (see cover image).
- Ports: Sites of circulation, colonial trade, and contemporary infrastructures of control.
- The Mediterranean as a contested space: Migration, extraction, surveillance, and unequal mobility.
Spread from Tom Lyon's contribution.
Opening the book in the deep sea - with Mae Lubetkin.
Speakers
Aldeide Delgado – Founder & Director of WOPHA (Women Photographers International Archive). Curator of An Oceanic Beginning (Elles × Paris Photo 2026) and speaker on the Caribbean as a critical oceanic framework.
Chiara Indelicato – Photographer based on Stromboli, working with analogue black-and-white processes using eco-methods (coffee, seawater). Author of the photobook Pelle di Lava.
Julia Gat – Photographer (Paris/Marseille) documenting Mediterranean communities. Winner of the 2025 CNAP Grant and co-founder of SOLAR Collective.
Maite Vanhellemont – Artist exploring family and colonial histories through photography, video, and text. Exhibited in Kraków and Paris Photo; upcoming FW:Books publication.
Nienke Coers – Writer and curator (Rotterdam) investigating movement, place, and identity in visual culture.
Sonia Levy – Artist-filmmaker (Amazigh/Moroccan-Polish) examining submerged ecologies, power, and environmental transformation.
Tom Lyon – Documentary photographer probing European border regimes and migration. Exhibited at FOMU and Musée de la Photographie.
Fiepke van Niel – works as a curator for Fotomuseum Hilversum and as independent curator and writer on her own projects.
Nuria Bofarull – Curator, researcher, and co-founder of Oceanographies Collective. Co-editor of TRIGGER #7: Ocean.
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This event takes place within:
- Group exhibition A Wider Gaze (Atelier Néerlandais, Paris Photo 2026)
- Elles × Paris Photo 2026, featuring An Oceanic Beginning (curated by Aldeide Delgado, WOPHA)
- Book launch of TRIGGER #7: Ocean
This conversation invites a rethinking of photography from the waves, addressing the need to decentre visual narratives, explore ecological and material approaches to photography, and engage with migration, memory, and maritime infrastructures through interdisciplinary dialogues between art and marine science.
Spread from Ayasha Guerin's contribution.
Spread from Yvette Monahan's contribution.