Open Doors Gallery

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Open Doors Gallery

Championing emerging photographic artists Founded in 2017, OPEN DOORS GALLERY is a global platform for contemporary photographic artists.

The gallery aims to give the world’s best emerging talent an opportunity to reach new audiences, and works with a very broad range of artists. From unique collage and sculptural artworks to dark room creations, landscapes, portrait and street artists. As well as representing the developing careers of several award winning photographic artists, OPEN DOORS believes in making art accessible, affordable and obtainable. We aim to surprise people by challenging what they believe photographic art to be whilst also respecting the more traditional photographic methods. Art is for all and our aim is to show art lovers that photography is the perfect medium to explore and to collect. Open Doors has a strong presence online () choosing to showcase a wide variety of styles from beyond our family of represented artists. Hoping to broaden people’s understanding of the medium. Whilst the digital side is important, we also believe wholeheartedly in the value of seeing and experiencing these artworks up close through our programme of exhibitions and art fairs that we host and participate in throughout the year.

06/10/2026

Congratulations to Elena Helfrecht, Runner-up of the OD Photo Prize 2026 for her series Unternächte.

“The same fire that keeps a house warm can burn it down.”

Elena Helfrecht [b.1992, Germany] is a visual artist based in Bavaria whose photographic practice explores the inner space and phenomena of consciousness, emerging from an autobiographical context and opening into the surreal and fantastic. Her work is shaped by the folklore and landscapes of her home, and by a deep engagement with art history, literature and psychology.

Unternächte takes its name from what Helfrecht’s grandmother and great-grandmother called the nights between the Winter Solstice and Epiphany, known more widely as the Twelve Nights of Christmas: a liminal time when, in folklore, the gates to the beyond open and spirits descend into the mortal realm. In her family, these nights were marked by tales and traditions passed down through generations of women seeking guidance on the uncertain path ahead. Made over nine years, the series stages, re-stages and reimagines family story and local tradition until the lines between memory and invention, comfort and threat, begin to blur. Rooted in folk horror, it recognises that the beliefs which unite a community can turn against those within it as easily as those outside it. The 74-image series will be published as a book by VOID in October 2026.

Discover more from this year’s OD Photo Prize via the link in our bio.

OD Photo Prize 2026 Runner-up • Elena Helfrecht

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Upcoming Art Fair | Imprint
29 October—1 November | Lawrence Hall, London

Upcoming Art Fair | Paris Photo
12—15 November | Grand Palais, Paris

05/10/2026

Congratulations to Leonardo Taddei, Runner-up of the OD Photo Prize 2026 for his series Lekhallen.

Leonardo Taddei [b.1994, Italy] is an Italian artist based in Gothenburg, Sweden, whose recent work is a playful exploration of how spaces can be created, activated and interpreted through artistic practice. Working primarily in photography, he often combines the image with text and sculptural elements.

Lekhallen began in November 2023, when Taddei moved into Stacken, a housing complex thirty minutes from the centre of Gothenburg that is home to collectives, families and individuals. On its communal fifth floor sits the Lekhall, or playroom: an almost empty space with a distinctive smell. Taddei turned it into a studio and stage, inviting residents and friends to take part in anti-heroic performances for the camera. Rather than documenting play, the process activated it, so that taking a photograph became part of the game itself. Drawing on the historian Tim Stott’s idea of the playground as a space defined by its boundaries, the project considers how naming and delimiting a space creates rules, roles and hierarchies of power. Realised through black-and-white photographs and wooden sculptures, it begins from the naïve idea that adults have forgotten how to play, and arrives at another belief: “adulthood begins when one forgets that one is playing.”

Discover more from this year’s OD Photo Prize via the link in our bio.

OD Photo Prize 2026 Runner-up
Follow Leonardo Taddei

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Upcoming Art Fair | Imprint
29 Oct—1 Nov • Lawrence Hall, London

Upcoming Art Fair | Paris Photo
12—15 Nov • Grand Palais, Paris

02/10/2026

Jatin Gulati [b.1992, India] is an Indian artist whose practice spans photography, drawing and text, exploring how dominant narratives are sustained through images, systems and structures of authority. Trained in architecture as well as photography, he tests the limits of the photographic image, drawing on the domestic setting and the family archive to trace colonial histories and postcolonial conditions in independent India.

“The more I cut, the more the image opens into something larger... Systems and structures, roles and relationships, histories and masculinities, and the ways we learn to perform.”

In Effigy of Man, Gulati turns to the photographs of his late grandfather, a strict, orthodox patriach displaced from Multan to Haryana during the Partition of 1947. In the studio he cuts, re-stages and inhabits fragments of the figure, questioning the masculinity an archive passes down through generations and what remains hidden.

Discover more from this year’s OD Photo Prize via the link in our bio.

OD Photo Prize 2026 Winner • Jatin Gulati

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Upcoming Art Fair | Imprint
29 October—1 November | Lawrence Hall, London

Upcoming Art Fair | Paris Photo
12—15 November | Grand Palais, Paris

01/10/2026

OD Photo Prize 2026 🏆 Winner

Congratulations to Jatin Gulati [] for his winning series, Effigy of Man.

“It is the suspicion of the image that drives my work.”

In this series, Jatin [b.1992, India] turns to the photographs of his late grandfather, still remembered a decade after his death as a revered and often feared patriarch, a persona shaped by his displacement from Multan to Haryana during the Partition of 1947. Cutting, re-staging and embodying fragments of these images in the studio, he opens up the systems, roles and masculinities a family archive hands down, and makes room for vulnerability.

Discover the full results, including the Judges’ Picks and Shortlist, via the link in our bio. We will also share features on each Shortlisted artist here over the coming weeks. Thank you to everyone for your submissions this year!

Now in its sixth edition, the OD Photo Prize continues to discover remarkable new voices in photographic art. Jatin will be exhibited in London in January alongside our two Runners-up.

Thanks to our partners |

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Upcoming Art Fair |
29 October—1 November | London

Upcoming Art Fair |
12—15 November | Paris

24/09/2026

Marco Rapaccini | Hand, 2026 [NEW]

Marco Rapaccini is a Rome-based photographic artist working in cyanotype and analogue processes to explore the interplay between memory, place, and the passage of time. His ongoing Litorali series draws on the coastal landscape of Castelporziano and Capocotta, a nature reserve on the Roman coast where he spent his childhood summers. Through hand-toned cyanotype grid sequences and diptychs, the artist slows down and reimagines the dunes and the surrounding landscape.

Hand [Shown above] is a new work from the series and, we think, the most significant piece Marco has made to date. A single unique work built from 56 individually hand-toned cyanotype prints, arranged in a grid. Sand slipping through fingers, frame by frame.

Hand, 2026 • Marco Rapaccini
66.5 x 33.6 cm • Unique cyanotypes on Awagami paper
POR

DM for availability and the full catalogue
More new work will be released soon

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Upcoming Art Fair | Imprint Art Fair
29 October—01 November | London

Upcoming Art Fair | Paris Photo
12—15 November | Paris

19/09/2026

The OD Photo Prize Shortlist is announced next week. Big thanks to our Media Partner for counting us down to the announcement. Stay tuned!

[3/3] Hi, Thomas King here from 1000 Words. I’m continuing my takeover of Open Doors Gallery’s Instagram, and I wanted to use my time here to point towards a few pieces from the magazine that I’ve particularly enjoyed seeing readers engage with this year.

Following on from Tim’s writing on Mark Sealy’s exhibition, another feature that really seemed to strike a chord with readers was Peter Watkins’ thoughtful essay on Katherine Hubbard’s The Great Room – a project we described as having the makings of a modern classic. What I find compelling about Peter’s writing is the way he resists the obvious reading of Hubbard’s work. It would be easy to approach The Great Room primarily as a project about dementia, caregiving or the experience of watching a parent change. But Peter looks beyond those immediate concerns, asking more difficult and ultimately more interesting questions about photography, in this case: can a relationship between mother and daughter, or photographer and subject, ever really be described as a collaboration when the balance between the two is continually shifting? It’s a beautifully nuanced piece, reflecting Hubbard’s photographs and one that I think rewards a slower read.

Read more at: https://1000wordsmag.com/the-ethics-of-looking-at-a-mother/

Handles | Tim Clark Peter Watkins Vienna Secession Loose Joints Company

Artists | Katherine Hubbard

Image captions:

1 • Katherine Hubbard, one fifty one (hand to face), 2021.
2 • Katherine Hubbard, one fifty one, 2021
3 • Katherine Hubbard, one fifty one (after all), 2025.
4 • Katherine Hubbard, one fifty one (s), 2025.
5 • Katherine Hubbard, one fifty one (untitled), 2025.

18/09/2026

We are delighted to have 1000 Words taking over the feed this week. With the OD Photo Prize Shortlist announced next week, it’s over to our Media Partner to count us down.

[2/3] Thomas King here, Editorial Assistant at 1000 Words, taking over Open Doors Gallery’s Instagram feed where I’m sharing some of the features that have resonated most with readers so far from 2026.

One of the pieces I’m particularly pleased to revisit was published in July, when the voice of our own Tim Clark returned to the pages of 1000 Words Magazine. Writing as editor, Tim reflected on one of the most thoughtful and ambitious photographic exhibitions of recent years: Mark Sealy’s Alliance, Infinity, Love – in the Face of the Other. Bringing together work by Dawoud Bey, Sandra Brewster, Mónica de Miranda, Tyler Mitchell and many others, Sealy’s exhibition explored ideas of identity, memory, history and our relationships to one another through an extraordinarily rich range of photographic practices. There’s a lot that could be said about the exhibition as a whole, but here I’d like to draw attention to the work of Mario Cravo Neto, whose photographs offered one of the show’s most striking and enigmatic encounters.

Read more at: Read more at: https://1000wordsmag.com/mark-sealys-vision-of-photography-beyond-critique

Handles | Tim Clark Triennial of Photography, Deichtorhallen Hamburg Autograph

Artists | Dawoud Bey Sandra Brewster Monica De Miranda Tyler Mitchell Instituto Mario Cravo Neto

Image captions:

1 • Tyler Mitchell, Self Decoration (no.1), 2022 © Tyler Mitchell. Courtesy the artist and Gagosian Gallery
2 • Tyler Mitchell, Ghost Image, 2024 © Tyler Mitchell. Courtesy the artist and Gagosian Gallery
3 • Hélène Amouzou, Self portrait Molenbeek, 2009 © Hélène Amouzou
4 • Inuuteq Storch, Keepers of the Ocean, 2016-2022 © Courtesy the artist and Wilson Saplana Gallery
5 • Mario Cravo Neto, Odé, 1989 © Mario Cravo Neto

17/09/2026

We are delighted to have 1000 Words taking over the feed this week. With the OD Photo Prize Shortlist announced next week, it’s over to our Media Partner to count us down.

[1/3] Hello, I’m Thomas King, Editorial Assistant at 1000 Words, and today I’m taking over Open Doors Gallery’s Instagram feed to highlight a few of the magazine’s features that have resonated most with our readers so far this year.

Back in April, regular 1000 Words contributor Rica Cerbarano took a discerning look at Larry Sultan’s Water Over Thunder, published by MACK. Part journal, part retrospective, the book extends the documentary experiments of Sultan’s earlier work, revealing an artist constantly testing, mediating and negotiating meaning through uncertainty. Upon discovery of the sheer volume and diversity of his unpublished written material, Water Over Thunder confirms Sultan’s longstanding passion for writing, which, much like his photography, reveals the evolution of his artistic thinking – his attempts, experiments, uncertainties, and positions. It would be too easy to reduce the book to a portrait of artistic vulnerability, writes Rica. And that undersells it. What Water Over Thunder ultimately reveals is something more elemental, that is, Sultan’s humanity or search for it.

Read more at: https://1000wordsmag.com/can-doubt-be-a-way-of-looking-on-larry-sultan/

Handles: Tim Clark Rica Cerbarano MACK

Artist | The Estate of Larry Sultan

Image captions:

1 • Larry Sultan, Dad on Bed, 1984, Pictures from Home
2 • Larry Sultan, Pictures from Home, 1983-92, proof print
3 • Larry Sultan, Journal entry, mid-1990s
4 • Larry Sultan, Untitled #1, 1978–82
5 • Larry Sultan, Pictures from Home, maquette, early 1980s

14/09/2026

Marco Rapaccini [b.1982, Rome] is an Italian photographic artist whose practice explores the interplay between memory, place and the passage of time. Balancing documentary precision with a poetic sensibility, Rapaccini navigates themes of identity and solitude through light, composition and quietly evocative visual storytelling.

His recent work has focused on cyanotype, an early photographic print process he uses to reimagine the coastal dunes of his childhood into multi-panelled artworks, alongside images of found objects gathered on walks. Flowers, shells, cuttlefish bones.

New work is coming soon to Open Doors Gallery

Follow or join our Collectors Circle newsletter via the link in bio to catch the first glimpse.

OD Artist • Marco Rapaccini

OD Photo Prize 🏆 Shortlist announced soon

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