Hi everyone,

The images here come from several projects that, on paper, look very organized. In practice, they involved a lot of waiting, some wrong turns, and the familiar exercise of pretending you meant to end up exactly where you did.

Across assignments, the pattern is similar: long stretches of observation, interrupted by brief moments when everything aligns just long enough to make a photograph. The work is less about chasing images than staying present until they happen, and having the nerve to press the shutter.

This selection is a small cross-section of that process. The photographs are the clean part. The rest stays off camera.

Kindly,
Anne

Publications / DSW Grant

Veronica Frenzel and I received this year’s Media Prize of DSW (Deutsche Stiftung Weltbevölkerung), which enabled us to report from South Africa on the impact of U.S. development aid cuts on trans communities.

USAID-funded clinics once provided free hormone treatment. When funding ended overnight in January, the clinics closed. Trans people did not stop transitioning. But the cuts hit the most vulnerable forcing communities to reorganize and fight for an independent future.

more images here / story published in Stern and Brigitte in 11/25 and 02/26

Am Ort der Hoffnung / Brigitte Magazin

Nearly thirty years ago, the residents of the Isle of Eigg, a small island in Scotland’s Inner Hebrides, chose a different way of living. One rooted in community, sustainability, self-sufficiency, and democracy.

Reporting from the island with Ariane Heimbach for Brigitte, Eigg felt like a rare kind of luxury: not defined by money, but by simplicity, nature, and togetherness.

It offered a glimpse of how life might look otherwise. I missed the island the moment I stepped back onto the ferry, but I take comfort in knowing that such a place exists in our chaotic world.

more images here / story published in 09/25

Die Mutmacherinnen / Chrismon & Chrismon Plus Magazin

Since January 2025, when USAID was shut down, vital funding for HIV care has disappeared in South Africa. In the township of Khayelitsha just outside Cape Town three women continue the work voluntarily without pay or protection.

story published in 01/26

Work in Mexico

Over the past years, I have been documenting projects by Brot für die Welt around the globe. Last November, I traveled to Mexico to work on stories about femicides and human rights alongside writer Cecibel Romero. Our time in Oaxaca was very productive, and I’m excited to share results soon.

I am planning to return to Mexico City this April for more reporting ahead of the World Cup this summer. Please feel free to get in touch.

Portraits

A portrait listens as much as it looks.

I do love to take portraits and I am sharing one that I recently took, Nora Zabel in Heidelberg for taz FUTURZWEI. You can check the updated portrait section on my website for more new portraits.

And as always: image licensing via laif agency