Belfast Photo Festival

Belfast Photo Festival Belfast Photo Festival is the UK and Ireland's largest annual international festival of photography and image culture.
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International Belfast Photo Festival: 4 - 30 June 2026 Belfast Photo Festival is one of the leading photography festivals in Europe and the largest annual international festival of photography in the UK and Ireland. The Festival includes talks/seminars, tours, workshops, films, renowned masterclasses and, of course, some fantastic parties. We encourage people to view, participate, and expand their enjoyment of photography.

02/07/2026

BELFAST PHOTO FESTIVAL AT BOTANIC GARDENS - UNTIL 5 JULY

Explore exhibitions of new 'Horizons' at the Botanic Gardens, featuring Thadde Comar's 'How Was Your Dream?’, Vahram Aghasyan's 'Modality' and all of the 2026 Open Submissions winners.

BOTANIC GARDENS | EXTENDED TO 5 JULY | DAWN TO DUSKExplore exhibitions of new 'Horizons' at the Botanic Gardens, featuri...
30/06/2026

BOTANIC GARDENS | EXTENDED TO 5 JULY | DAWN TO DUSK

Explore exhibitions of new 'Horizons' at the Botanic Gardens, featuring Thadde Comar's 'How Was Your Dream?’. The project addresses new forms of demonstration and insurrection in an era shaped by increasingly seamless systems of control.

View all the 2026 Open Submissions winners, including Laura Pannack's intimate portrait of adolescence and resilience in 'The Journey Home From School' and Louise Desnos' reflection on laziness and idleness in 'Acedia'.

Please note, the Photo-book Library is closing on 30 June.

EXTENDED TO 4 JULY | TUES - SAT | 11AM - 5PMCAMERA OBSOLETE? DISMANTLE, RECAST OR RESISTSPECIAL OPENING: LATE NIGHT ART ...
30/06/2026

EXTENDED TO 4 JULY | TUES - SAT | 11AM - 5PM
CAMERA OBSOLETE? DISMANTLE, RECAST OR RESIST
SPECIAL OPENING: LATE NIGHT ART - THURS 2 JULY 6PM
BELFAST EXPOSED

‘Camera Obsolete?’ is a major interactive exhibition by Belfast Photo Festival exploring what happens to photography as the medium moves deeper into the AI era. Part participation, part spectacle and part public experiment, it invites you to get hands-on with obsolete cameras and decide what comes next.

Dismantle cameras and examine the mechanics, recast fragments into new sculptural forms, or resist by adopting a camera and returning it to creative use.

The sculptures made in the exhibition will stay on display throughout and will help shape a permanent public artwork for Belfast Botanic Gardens.

Dismantle, recast and resist activities are open to all ages, with no booking required. Please note: the destroy room is now closed so our team can sift components and fragments.

THE JOURNEY HOME FROM SCHOOLLAURA PANNACK4 JUNE - 5 JULY | DAWN TO DUSKBOTANIC GARDENSThe Journey Home explores the dail...
28/06/2026

THE JOURNEY HOME FROM SCHOOL
LAURA PANNACK
4 JUNE - 5 JULY | DAWN TO DUSK
BOTANIC GARDENS

The Journey Home explores the daily walk to and from school in Cape Town’s gang-governed Cape Flats, where the threat of violence shapes ordinary childhood routines. Made collaboratively with young participants, the work offers an intimate portrait of adolescence, danger and resilience.

Laura Pannack is a London-based photographic artist. Her practice investigates the space between fact and feeling, rooted in analogue photography, primarily medium and large format, and expanded through collage, mixed media and experimental techniques. Grounded in the tradition of social documentary portraiture, her work stretches the boundaries of narrative and authorship, creating images that are as much about internal landscapes as external realities.

ORGAN DONORCAMERON CLARKE26 - 28 JUNECARLISLE MEMORIAL CHURCHVault Artist Studios member Cameron Clarke’s ‘Organ Donor’ ...
27/06/2026

ORGAN DONOR
CAMERON CLARKE
26 - 28 JUNE
CARLISLE MEMORIAL CHURCH

Vault Artist Studios member Cameron Clarke’s ‘Organ Donor’ is a large-scale immersive sound installation that brings back the sacred sound of a church organ to Carlisle Memorial which has been organ-less since it was closed in 1980. Providing the sound this time round is a humble 80 year old Salvation Army pedal organ rescued from a demolished church hall.

The pedal organ alongside ambient electronics will form the basis of a haunting and dreamlike soundscape resonating through a multi-speaker system in the space, bringing together two abandoned entities who found new life in unexpected ways.

THE SONG OF INVISIBLE BIRDSFLORENCE GOUPIL4 JUNE - 5 JULY | 10AM - 4PMTROPICAL RAVINE, BOTANIC GARDENS‘The Song of Invis...
26/06/2026

THE SONG OF INVISIBLE BIRDS
FLORENCE GOUPIL
4 JUNE - 5 JULY | 10AM - 4PM
TROPICAL RAVINE, BOTANIC GARDENS

‘The Song of Invisible Birds’ explores the violent pressures facing Indigenous peoples living in voluntary isolation in the Peruvian Amazon. For centuries, these nomadic peoples have fled colonisation, enslavement and the violence of the rubber boom, retreating deeper into the forest to preserve a way of life bound to the biodiversity on which they depend.

Since 2023, a political campaign has sought to deny their existence and open the way for legal and illegal extraction of gas, oil and timber within their territories. They continue to ask not to be contacted, photographed or seen. For this reason, Goupil has not photographed them, instead capturing the lands through which they move and those who have had brief but profound encounters with them.

Florence Goupil is a French-Peruvian documentary photographer based in Peru. Through a multimedia approach, her work explores the intersections of ethnobotany, environmental and human rights, and the living memory of Indigenous communities.

She is a National Geographic Explorer and contributor, a Pulitzer Center grantee and a 2024–25 Magnum Foundation Fellow. She has received major international recognition, including the PhMuseum Women Photographers Grant, the POY Latam award for Ibero-American Photographer of the Year and the Nouvelles Écritures Award from La Gacilly Photo Festival. Her work has been exhibited internationally and published in titles including The New York Times Magazine, National Geographic, Atmos and British Journal of Photography.

MSC NAPOLIPAUL MCCAMBRIDGE24 - 26 JUNE | 12 - 4PMDIGITAL ARTS STUDIOSSPECIAL OPENING: LATE NIGHT ART | THURS 2 JULY | 6 ...
26/06/2026

MSC NAPOLI
PAUL MCCAMBRIDGE
24 - 26 JUNE | 12 - 4PM
DIGITAL ARTS STUDIOS
SPECIAL OPENING: LATE NIGHT ART | THURS 2 JULY | 6 - 8PM

On 18 January 2007, the UK-flagged container ship MSC Napoli was damaged in the English Channel and deliberately beached in Lyme Bay to avoid a larger environmental disaster.

Following the beaching, the ship’s main hull was brought to Harland and Wolff in Belfast for decontamination and dismantling. Exactly one hundred years after work began on the Titanic, Harland and Wolff undertook its first ship dismantling project with the MSC Napoli, marking a striking shift from maritime construction to industrial deconstruction.

This immersive exhibition by Paul McCambridge brings together photographic imagery, ambisonic audio and salvaged steel to trace the aftermath of the MSC Napoli and document its nine-month dismantling in Belfast. The work reflects on labour, industry, salvage and the changing meanings of a historic shipyard.

Paul McCambridge has worked as a photographer for over 40 years, producing assignments for national and international newspapers and magazines. His work has appeared in publications including Newsweek, Time, Spotlight, Village Magazine, The Observer, The Guardian, The Irish Times, The Sunday Times, The Sunday Tribune, Sunday Business Post and Dagens Nyheter.

HOW WAS YOUR DREAM?THADDÉ COMAR4 JUNE - 5 JULY | DAWN TO DUSKBOTANIC GARDENS‘How Was Your Dream?’ is a documentary photo...
25/06/2026

HOW WAS YOUR DREAM?
THADDÉ COMAR
4 JUNE - 5 JULY | DAWN TO DUSK
BOTANIC GARDENS

‘How Was Your Dream?’ is a documentary photographic project created during the Hong Kong protests between June and October 2019. The work addresses new forms of demonstration and insurrection in an era shaped by increasingly seamless systems of control. The title refers to a phrase used by demonstrators to speak discreetly about their experiences of protest.

Thaddé Comar is based between Lausanne and Paris, where he works across commissioned photography, editorial assignments and personal projects. His practice is closely tied to current affairs, protest movements, and the staging of information and power. He has worked extensively on subjects including the Black Bloc movement in Paris and the Hong Kong protests of 2019, using photography to examine surveillance, repression, media spectacle, and contemporary political unrest. Thaddé has received notable recognition, including the Grand Prix du Jury at the Hyères Festival in 2023, and has been featured through platforms such as FUTURES Photography and the Swiss Design Awards.

Supported by Pro Helvetia and the Swiss Cultural Fund UK.

ONE BED, TWO BLANKETS, EIGHTY-FIVE RULESSABINE HESS AND NICOLAS POLLI4 - 30 JUNE | DAWN TO DUSKCITY HALLA project in con...
25/06/2026

ONE BED, TWO BLANKETS, EIGHTY-FIVE RULES
SABINE HESS AND NICOLAS POLLI
4 - 30 JUNE | DAWN TO DUSK
CITY HALL

A project in continuous evolution, ‘One Bed, Two Blankets, Eighty-Five Rules’ by Sabine Hess and Nicolas Polli, plays with the expectations and ideas of a relationship, establishing rules for living harmoniously. After meeting in Ticino, Switzerland and continuing a long-distance relationship, the couple decided to move in together in 2023 and began a project about their shared life. During an artistic residency in Val Verzasca, Hess and Polli built an imaginary house. Alternating between symbolic representations and dramatisations of their relationship, the project plays with standards and ideas held, establishing rules for living harmoniously.

Sabine Hess is a Swiss-German photographer based in Switzerland. She graduated from the London College of Communication, UAL. Sabine is interested in our relationship with nature, intimate stories of life and togetherness. Alongside her documentary projects, Hess works in editorial and portrait photography. Her work has appeared in publications such as FT Weekend Magazine, Das Magazin, Die Zeit, M Le Magazine du Monde and Monocle.

Nicolas Polli is a photographer, graphic designer and teacher from Switzerland, who enjoys shifting between personal and commercial matters. Nicolas studied Art Direction at ECAL, École Cantonal d’art de Lausanne, where he currently teaches in both the MA in photography and BA in Visual Communication. In 2018 and 2020 he won the Swiss Design Award, and since 2021, Nicolas is the resident at Atelier Robert in Biel/Bienne.

Supported by Pro Helvetia and the Swiss Cultural Fund UK.

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