Social Documentary Network (SDN) is a global community of documentary photographers, editors, curators, NGOs, students, journalists, and others who believe in the power of visual storytelling to build understanding and appreciation for the complexities, nuances, wonders, and contradictions that abound in the world today. Since our founding in 2008, the SDN website has featured more than 3,000 exhibits by nearly 2,000 photographers from all corners of the globe. Today, we have grown beyond the boundaries of a computer screen and produce gallery exhibitions, educational programs, calls for entries and our print magazine, ZEKE: The Magazine of Global Documentary. Recent exhibits on SDN have explored migration, the rising seas of Antarctica, Iran, asylum in America, teen mothers, and nomads of Kyrgyzstan.
2023 ZEKE Award winners include visual stories on resistance against extractive industries in Ecuador, violence against women in Ethiopia, the Vatican apology to the Indigenous community in Canada, a thriving Queer community in Appalachia and others.
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Presented by Social Documentary Network, ZEKE Magazine
These documentary exhibits explore sustainable solutions to the climate crisis: the Indigenous People’s Burn Network in the western United States; Nemo’s Garden in Italy — the world’s first underwater greenhouse; the African Women Rising’s Permagarden Program in Uganda, and others.
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Last Wildest Places by Jason Houston, focuses on deforestation in the Purús-Manu region in southeastern Peru. Cousins by Kristen Emack, is a poetic look at the photographer’s daughter and her three cousins, and their intimate involvement in each other’s lives.
Toby Binder and Rory Doyle are first place winners of the ZEKE Award for Documentary Photography, a new honor presented by the Social Documentary Network. Sponsors include Digital Silver Imaging, Canson-Infinity, and Leica.
LiveZEKE is a new way to experience documentary photography, combining live video conferencing and traditional documentary practice.
Learn MoreThree ZEKE Award recipients will present their winning projects and discuss doing documentary work in different parts of the world.
Learn MoreZEKE Award winners Kristen Emack, Jason Houston, and Nicoló Filippo Rosso will present their winning projects and discuss their views on the state of documentary photography today.
Learn MoreThis panel discussion will explore where documentary photography is heading in the second decade of the 21st century.
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