MARCEL MAYER

Documentary Photography

Marcel Mayer is a German documentary photographer, visual storyteller, and writer whose work lies at the intersection of documentary reportage, visual narrative, and artistic engagement.

After more than 15 years in the international tourism industry, he began his photographic practice with the aim of moving beyond classical travel photography. Instead of postcard idylls, his images seek closeness to people, their life worlds, and private spaces. His visual language is characterized by authenticity and intimacy, directing attention to everyday realities that reveal both beauty and hardship.

His artistic work focuses on processes of social transformation, memory culture, and human resilience. In 2019/20, he documented the last self-employed pig butchers in the dark alleys of Bangkok—a reportage published by South East Asia Globe. This marked the beginning of his path into long-term documentary projects.

A particularly formative experience was the flood disaster in Germany’s Ahr Valley in July 2021, which Mayer experienced first-hand as someone directly affected. From this personal perspective, he developed a year-long photographic documentation following six individuals. The project was published as an extensive long version (68 images) and a shorter edit (44 images) and was distributed internationally by dpa picture alliance on the first anniversary of the disaster in 2022. Additional publications of this work appeared on ntv, in FOCUS, and the Süddeutsche Zeitung.

Alongside his projects in Germany, Mayer increasingly works on transnational themes. In Bosnia and Herzegovina, he explores the legacy of war and questions of identity among a young generation in Sarajevo. At the same time, he is developing a project on Germany’s nuclear phase-out and the transformation toward renewable energy, linking questions of energy, environment, and society.

His works have been published in international media such as GEO Online, he has spoken in podcasts about his documentary approaches, and he participated in the Magnum Photos Workshop 2025 in Sarajevo led by Jérôme Sessini.

Mayer’s visual storytelling is defined by an immersive approach: he spends extended periods of time on location, builds close relationships with people, and documents their stories with respect and sensitivity. He understands his work as a bridge between personal experience and collective memory, between documentary precision and visual poetry.