Al Naw Hospital in Omdurman is the last functioning public hospital in Sudan’s capital, providing care to dozens of war-injured civilians daily alongside regular patients. Since April 2023, Sudan has been devastated by a brutal conflict between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), following decades of an Islamist dictatorship, the 2019 revolution, and dashed hopes for democracy. The hospital itself has been repeatedly attacked by RSF forces but remains a lifeline in the chaos. Resources are critically limited: there is not enough medicine, oxygen, equipment, or space, and many die from preventable infections due to these shortages. Refugees seek shelter within the hospital, and volunteers work tirelessly to help the poor access life-saving medicine. Most of the doctors are war victims or refugees themselves, living at the hospital for weeks and working day and night under harrowing conditions.

They worked on him for five months. It looks magnificent, and they hate it. Because Saliha and Rahima don't want to make carpets, they want to go to school - but the Taliban forbid them. 15-year-old Saliha's hands dart forward, turn left, right, pull with a jerk, reach out again, turn, pull again, at a speed where the many movements become one to the eye. The girl sits in a mud-walled shack with a tiny window, in a suburb of Herat, a city in deep western Afghanistan. Saliha's neck is bent, twelve hours a day. In front of her, thousands of white threads rise steeply like a wall, a lattice of yarn, almost to the ceiling. "I hate him," Saliha says. Text excerpt from article about women who have been knotting carpets since the Taliban took power.

Russia's invasion of Ukraine followed its occupation of Crimea and the destabilization of the Donbass by Moscow-directed so-called separatists eight years earlier. Kremlin ruler Vladimir Putin had been emboldened by weak sanctions and new gas deals to go even further. Many people in Western societies only became aware of the danger posed by Russia's new imperialism with the full-scale invasion of February 24, 2022: Moscow's attack on its neighbor is also an invasion of Europe. Since the beginning of the full-scale invasion, I traveled to Ukraine several times to photograph. My photos from Kyiv during the siege, from Bucha immediately after the liberation, and from Bakhmut during the battle for the city are testimonies to Russian brutality. They should serve as a warning that Ukraine must not be left alone again. Once you have looked into the faces of people who have lost everything, you cannot look away.

There are still about 4,000 practicing witches in Romania, and many Romanians trust in their power. Costumers between Los Angeles and Belgrade bungled Mihaela Minca, one of the most powerful witches, for love advice or ask questions about skin creams for illnesses that are no longer used by conventional medicine. Her phone number is on Facebook and Instagram, rituals are transmitted to Florida via skype. Witchcraft is a modern business model. At the same time, Romanis are still discriminated and persecuted. What political influence do witches have today?

In the centre of Kabul there is an infamous area whose reputation precedes itself. Though difficult to believe, this reputation is actually dwarfed by the raw smell of human excrement that engulfs this place. We are talking about Pule Sukhta, Kabul's heroin city. Under a giant bridge, tens of thousands addicts have set up their home and these resident's waking lives are determined by the local narcotic. Those who live in Pule Sukhta are barred from Kabul's society, but simultaneously an independent social structure with rules for coexistence has been cultivated; this framework keeps the ever-growing community alive. Pule Sukhta is many things at the same time, but it is clearly a symptom of the ubiquitous Afghan crisis, a terminus and extremely dangerous place - even by Afghan standards.

With my longterm project "Like a Bird" i deal with circuses in Muslim countries and the desire for freedom in conflict areas. Seen from an outside perspective, e.g. someone from the “West”, one does not associate countries like Iran, Palestine or Afghanistan with the idea of the circus. How can the circus artists create this kind of free space and which dreams and hopes do they connect with their art? What kind of external effect does the circus create in these countries - as a place of escape from the everyday adversities (Gaza Strip) or the possibility for young girls to experience a free and equal atmosphere outside their parents' house (Afghanistan). A circus is a place free of religion, nationality or skincolor and thus a refugee in times of uncertainties or conflict.

Khalil Oghab was once called the Hercules of Persia. His son Ebrahim Oghab founded ‘Circus Khalil Oghab’ in 1991. Since its opening many international male artists come together to tour the Islamic Republic throughout the year. I was living one month with the Iranian Circus. What is the role of circus in a politically and socially closed country like Iran? A reflective work on trends, using circus as a medium. Is circus a mere form of entertainment or perhaps a politically powerful tool? All images are photographed in color and medium format.

Sirkus Islands is a portrait of the first and only circus in Iceland. Imbedded in islands scenery, the series combines mysterious portraits of the artists with pictures of the work in the arena as well as the daily routine backstage. Somewhere between social reportage and staged photography, the pictures tell a story of preserving such an old tradition and its position and meaning nowadays.