Guest Room aims to spark collaborations. That’s why Anna-Alix Koffi is teaming up with Sadikou Oukpedjo in choosing the theme for this instalment. Sadikou is an artist based in Abidjan, Ivory Coast. He primarily works with painting. Out of his works, which incorporate several traditional objects that he collected, he questions his cultural heritage through the prism of contemporary issues - political abuse of power, social inequalities and religious conflicts.

The framework for your submissions is a quote from Sadikou Oukpedjo:

“Pleasing doesn't interest me. It's expression I'm interested in. I try to express something.”

Why submit to Guest Room?

• Show your work to outstanding curators and gallerists.
• Get the chance to be published at Der Greif website, a highly-frequented international source of photographic art.
• Submit for free or for a small donation – you decide.

Voluntary donation

After over a decade of serving the international photography community Der Greif is now finally a registered non-profit. We believe this organizational structure best reflects our artistic and cultural mission. As always, your artistic contribution makes our work on Der Greif possible.

Since starting Guest Room in January 2015, we’ve been working hard to invite a broad range of practitioners, from gallerists to editors and curators. We are convinced that this format is an interesting and low-barrier approach to help artists get their work in front of people who might be interested in working with them. For this reason, we are asking you to consider making a financial contribution as well. That’s why we’re suggesting a voluntary donation of 5 € as a submission fee. 100% of the funds we collect from your donations will go towards helping us continue providing interesting opportunities for the photography community through Guest Room, and thus expand Der Greif.

We believe in inclusivity. We don’t want this suggested donation to stand in the way of your submission. If you are unable to contribute financially, please send an email to voucher@dergreif.org to receive a voucher code which will allow you to enter for free.

Thank you so much!

Based between Abidjan and Paris, Anna-Alix Koffi, Alix (for short) is the founding Creative Director and photo editor of OFF the wall photography journal (2013), woman paper (2016) : special editions for festivals, biennials and photo fairs, SOMETHING WE AFRICANS GOT (2017), journal about Africa, arts and critical thoughts and its magazine version SWAG High profiles (2019). All the publications are independent and self-published.