OPEN CALL: JRNL 17
EDITED BY FEDERICA CHIOCCHETTI
DIRECTOR OF THE MUSEE DES BEAUX-ARTS LE LOCLE (MBAL)
JRNL 17 SUMMER 2023 ISSUE CALL
JRNL 17 officially marks the start of year #5 for JRNL, and the opening of a new yearly cycle of exciting guest juried publications through April 2024 to culminate in the future 2nd JRNL Show later that year (stay tuned for more on the first JRNL Show this summer!).
To kick off this new beginning we’re delighted to collaborate with a leading figure of European photography, acclaimed writer, curator, editor and lecturer Federica Chiocchetti, the Director of the Musée des Beaux-Arts Le Locle (MBAL) in Switzerland! Be sure to submit up to 2 different projects for Federica’s consideration by Sunday, April 16, 2023 (11:59 pm PST)!
SUBMISSIONS
JRNL 17 submissions are open to all types of analogue work in existence today in reflection of our 21st century’s fast evolving photographic culture. This means a wide variety of methods of producing work is welcome from straight film to hybridized approaches marrying tangible medias of capture with digital intervention and editing. The core concept of work eligibility demands an essential “material step” must ground the fabrication of your images: this can relate to the capture of the information (film, glass, paper, etc.), its final presentation (hand printing, screen printing, etc.) and everything in between. Please refer to the “eligible work” section below for more details, and feel free to email us at info@fotofilmic with any questions.
Submissions can include up to 20 image files coming from either a single series/project (encouraged), or from 2 different ones (10 images/10 images split). Photographers are allowed a maximum of 2 different submissions per call (40 images total). All valid submissions will be forwarded to JRNL 17 guest editor Federica Chiocchetti at the end of the call, who will spend the next 4 weeks carefully reviewing them in detail. Her final 12 winners will be announced on Monday, May 15, 2023, with print copies coming available on/around June 21st, 2023.
PUBLICATION
Published photographers will each receive a free JRNL 17 print copy presenting their work in a 2-spread format (23″x15″) including a biography and artist statement. Federica, who specializes in photography and text and their many contemporary intersections, will write the JRNL 17 issue’s forewords as well as award its front and back covers to one or two of her selected photographers for even greater exposure.
2024 JRNL GROUP SHOW
JRNL 17 published photographers will also take part in the 2nd JRNL Group Show to be mounted at the FotoFilmic Space in the late summer/early fall of 2024 (exact dates tba). The show will feature the 48 photographers published in JRNL 17 (Summer ’23), JRNL 18 (Fall ’23), JRNL 19 (Winter ’24), and JRNL 20 (Spring ’24). Participation in the second JRNL Group Show is free of cost.
GUEST EDITOR: FEDERICA CHIOCCHETTI

Portrait © Anais Horn
Director of the Musée des Beaux-Arts Le Locle (MBAL) in Switzerland, she is a writer, curator, editor and lecturer specialising in photography and literature. Her next exhibition at MBAL is entitled The Pleasure of the Text and it is included among the 10 must see international shows in 2023. Through her platform Photocaptionist she collaborates with international institutions such as Jeu de Paume, Aperture and Foam. She holds a PhD in ‘Photo-Texts: Critical Intersections in History’, from London’s University of Westminster, which she has transformed into the educational project Word and Image Workshop (WIW) and a touring exhibition entitled The Pleasure of the Text, which will open at the end of March 2023 at MBAL. Previous curatorial projects include ‘Looking On: New Italian Photography’ at the Ravenna Art Museum (2019), the late Lorenzo Tricoli’s retrospective show ‘The Archive You Deserve’, for Fotografia Europea (2018), the festival Jaipur Photo on ‘Wanderlust’ in India (2017) and the exhibitions ‘Invisible Stratum’ for Tokyo International Photography Festival (2017). She has won a number of residencies (Fondation Michalski, Cité internationale des arts), awards (Kraszna-Krausz Best Photography Book, Vienna Photo Book Dummy) and in 2016 she was included among the ‘16 female curators shaking things up’ by Artnet after her shows ‘Feminine Masculine’ at the London Art Fair (2016), ‘Peter Henry Emerson: Presented by the Author’, while she was Art Fund Curatorial Fellow of Photographs at the Victoria and Albert Museum (2015) and ‘Amore e Piombo: The Photography of Extremes in 1970s Italy’ at the Brighton Photo Biennial/Photoworks (2014). Through her alter ego Candida Desideri, a subversive homage to her mother, she writes more experimental stuff such as short stories and prose poems, which have been published within the book ‘Nachbilder: Eine Foto Text Anthologie’ by Spector Books, Zurich University of the Arts and Fotomuseum Winterthur (2020) and Der Greif (2015).
@photocaptionist
@mbalelocle
ELIGIBLE WORK
JRNL is devoted to showcasing contemporary analogue photographic art in all its forms: all images submitted must have been captured either on film (any format or type), or using contemporary analogue and/or hybrid imaging processes such as but not limited to: paper negatives, pinhole & lensless photographs, wet plates/glass negatives, alternative processes & any coated light sensitive emulsions, platinum and screen printing, cyanotypes, anthotypes, as well as post-edited negatives in digital imaging softwares like Photoshop.
JRNL strives to publish new(er) works of photography that can provide fresh insights into 21st c. analogue photographic culture: all works submitted must have been created after January 1, 2015.
JRNL 17 CALL & PRODUCTION SCHEDULE
JRNL 17 CALL DEADLINE: Sunday, April 16, 2023
JRNL 17 jurying: April 17 – May 14, 2023
JRNL 17 winners announcement: May 15, 2023
JRNL 17 covers winner(s) announced: May 25, 2023
JRNL 17 pre-production: May 16 – June 11, 2023
JRNL 17 print copies available online: June 21, 2023
SUBMISSION FEE
US $35.00 per submission: can include up to 20 images total coming from 1 or 2 different series/projects. Maximum of 2 different submissions per photographer per call.
SUBMISSION FORM: ENTER YOUR WORK HERE
© Photo Credit (Cover Image): Laura Knauf, from the series “16 Days Late” (2022).