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The 5th edition of Lens op de Mens will be held from 8 June – 28 September 2025

During the summer of 2025, vzw Lens op de Mens – Fotofestival Pelt organises in cooperation with the town council of Pelt and CC Palethe the fifth edition of the biennial photo festival ‘Lens op de Mens’.

For this edition, we continue along the same path. Professional and amateur photographers from all over the world are invited to present their most beautiful images to the general public. Photos can be submitted from 15 October 2024 to 3 February 2025.

The main theme of this edition remaines, of course, ‘man’ in the broadest sense of the word. The sub-theme for 2025 is ‘the human vulnerability’.

The photo festival opens on Sunday, 8 June and closes on Sunday, 28 September 2025. We look beyond our national borders again through an international cooperation with RPS – the Royal Photographic Society, photo festival Vizualizator in Belgrade and several international guest speakers.

As organisers of Lens op de Mens (Focus on Man), we can look back on a very successful 4rd edition of our festival. We estimate that over 30,000 visitors descended on Pelt during the summer of 2023. We are very pleased with this success, which was only possible thanks to the many submissions from photographers worldwide and the cooperation of many volunteers. Our heartfelt thanks for this.

Sub-theme 2025 ‘Human vulnerability’

For this 5th edition of Lens op de Mens, we are also focusing on a sub-theme. This year, we emphasise human vulnerability.

Therefore, in 2025, we will present a special award for the photo that most aptly captures the vulnerability of humans and the society around us.

The main theme of Lens op de Mens will of course remain ‘human beings’ as in previous editions. The sub-theme ‘Human vulnerability’ is certainly not a compulsory theme.

Lens op de Mens 2023 programme was the best ever

Lens op de Mens – Photo festival Pelt was in its 4th edition in 2023. And it was again a great event. From 4 June to 1 October, more than 1,200 photos were exhibited in the streets and squares of Overpelt-Centre. Besides a selection of some 900 submitted photos, there were numerous guest exhibitions to admire.

World-renowned Magnum photographer Martin Parr was the absolute top of the guest photographers. His work was exhibited at CC Palethe. Martin Parr also gave a lecture on his work on 23 September.

The photo festival also had an eye for actuality. ‘They fight for us too’ was a haunting world-class exhibition on the war in Ukraine. This exhibition was officially opened on 25 June in the welding hall of the old technical school.

With Finn Antti Karppinnen’s exhibition and workshop on Artificial Intelligence, another topical theme was addressed. Festival partner Vizualizator from Belgrade explored this further internationally during a panel discussion.

Another guest photographer and guest speaker was Dutchman Frank Doorhof. He teached us all about photographing models with small reportage flashes.

With photos by Norwegian Helge Skodvin, we hoped to put a nice smile on your face.

Lens op de Mens chairwoman Carine Van Gerven showed a selection of her beautiful oeuvre of tableaux vivants at the St Martin’s Church.

Our Serbian friends from photo festival Vizualizator also provided a wonderful selection of reportage photography.

Pelt photographer Leon Alders told us the story of his visit to Kongolo and the murder of the 19 Belgian fathers in 1962.

Photoclub Zonhoven-Centrum exhibited photos from their project Vlieg op de Muur (Fly on the Wall) in Pelle Melle, where they used their camera to tell the story of the many nationalities that have found a permanent home in Limburg.

But the guest exhibitions of the laureates of Lens on Man 2021 and of our jury members and the members of RPS were also well worth seeing.

More on this on the guest exhibitions page.