Christine Fenzl is a photographer whose work documents young people in their living environments. Shown in series, her portraits bring together representatives of a generation or group, offering a picture of its unique environment and historical context. After studying photography in Munich, she spent several years in New York, returning to Germany and working as the assistant to American photographer Nan Goldin in Berlin in the early 1990s and subsequently as an independent photographer. Her images have been featured in ZEITmagazin, Liberation, New York Times Magazine, and Vogue.

Many of her projects are developed over an extended period, such as her photographs capturing children and teenagers in street football clubs run by NGOs in different continents. Through her photos shot in Lithuania, Poland, Belfast, Berlin, and Shanghai, she has offered a view of people coming of age on different sides of the former Iron Curtain or other lines of conflict. Her work also portrays individuals living on the cusp of major developments and societal shifts, as in her portraits taken in Shanghai during the preparations for EXPO 2009. Lasting over ten years, Fenzl’s Land in Sonne project on young adults in neighborhoods of former East Berlin was published by Hatje Cantz in 2019, marking the thirtieth anniversary of the fall of the Wall.

Women of Riyadh (2023) was commissioned for the Biennale. Working for two weeks, Fenzl documented women born and living in Riyadh in their homes and neighborhoods. Shown face on and at eye level, they are presented in near-life-size prints. Each image is the result of a collaborative process, in which women chose where and how they wished to be shown. Some decided to be photographed with a partner or parent, for example in a mother-daughter image, others alone or outdoors. Accompanying the portraits is a single photograph, a cityscape that shows a view of Riyadh from the perspective of a pedestrian. Fenzl always includes at least one image that provides a sense of location and the overall setting of her portraits. The variety of clothing and poses of these professional women— including a lawyer, architect, and wellness coach—expresses the confidence and accomplishment of a group of women at a time of transition and social change. For Fenzl, the project was an experience of “sharing moments that did not exist before” and reflecting on a new kind of visibility for women in all aspects of life.