Visual Cortex features long-form visual storytelling projects by recent graduates of ICP’s 2025 Online One-Year Certificate in Documentary Practice: Visual Storytelling program. Developed by a global cohort representing more than ten countries across the Americas, Europe, and Asia—including the United States, Guatemala, Mexico, France, Germany, Greece, Israel, Ukraine, Hong Kong, and India—the exhibition brings together a wide range of perspectives shaped by distinct cultural, social, and political contexts.
This exhibition is the culmination of months of rigorous work. Throughout the program, students honed their craft and developed deeply researched long-form visual narratives through one-on-one mentorship with ICP’s leading practitioners and professionals in the field, enriched by sustained dialogue within a global learning community. Working across time zones and geographies, the cohort engaged critically with visual storytelling as both a creative and ethical practice.
Visual Cortex presents a body of work developed in close collaboration with ICP faculty members Gaia Squarci and Alessandro Ghirelli, alongside the student cohort. Together, these projects reflect a shared commitment to visual narrative as a means of inquiry—one that foregrounds observation, responsibility, and emotional resonance. Find the full virtual presentation here.
"Storytelling is the act of remembering, sharing, and honoring lived experiences. We are a chorus of eighteen unique visual voices in a year-long journey.
We will never know the exact ingredients that makes our fellowship whole. Yet here we sit, around the table in vulnerability, in trust, and in reflection, hoping that every captured breath, tremor of movement, flicker of light will provide some clarity to a complex world.
This archive showcases the profound power of visual narrative: to document, communicate, and connect us to the enduring complexities of what make us human. Across this body of work lies a deep commitment to social responsibility, knowledge, and vulnerability"
-Graduates, 2025 Online One-Year Certificate in Documentary Practice: Visual Storytelling
Artists
Michelle Bertholle
Yana Boldyreva
Kristina Cordon
Amalia Cosmetatou
Allan Dinkoff
Kasey Edgerton
Emad Anis Hendrik Ette
Alex Huda
Mitra Khayyam
Tim Korostashevsky
Darina Petrova
Evgenii Petrushanskii
Steven Pitts
Swastik Pal
Nicolas Rosser
Shawn Pridgen
Hoi Yan Tang
Eli Williamson
