Interview with Annick Donkers; Published in our print edition #12

The motivation for my story was a personal experience I had at the age of 10. I was raised at the Flemish countryside in the province of Antwerp. I remember that one cold December night, I was walking back home from a friends’ house with my mom.

Annick Donkers is a documentary photographer from Antwerp, Belgium who currently lives and works in Mexico City. After obtaining a Masters’ degree in Psychology, she decided to specialize in photography.

She has received a grant from the Mexican Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 2008 and was selected to participate in the 2008 Seminar on Contemporary Photography at the Centro de la Imagen in Mexico City. Her work has been published (VICE, Dodho, Phases Magazine, Yet Magazine, All About Photo amongst others) and exhibited internationally (Benaki Museum Ahens, Fotomuseo Cuatro Caminos Mexico, Somerset House London, Museo Universitario del Chopo Mexico, Mexican Embassy and Embassy of the USA in Brussels amongst others).

She was one of the winners at the Survival International Competition (UK – 2015), won an award at the San José Photo Festival (Uruguay – 2016), the Sony Awards (UK – 2016), the MIFA awards (Russia – 2016), the IPA awards (USA – 2016), the TIFA awards (Japan – 2016), received an honorable mention at the Px3 Prix de la Photo (France – 2016), was selected at Latin American Photography vol.5/vol.6/vol.7 (USA – 2016-2017-2018) and for the cover of Dodho magazine (Spain – 2016). She was on the Shortlist for the Kolga Awards (Georgia – 2017) and Athens Photofestival (Greece – 2017), received the Premio Pedro Meyer at the Contest for Contemporary Photography (Mexico – 2017), an honorable mention at ND Awards and Chromatic Awards (2017), was the winner of the 2017 Color Prize of Dodho Magazine and the IPOTY Awards (2018), selected at Addis Fotofest (Ethiopia – 2018), Fotofestival Pelt (Belgium – 2019), Shortlist Belfast Photofestival (Ireland – 2019), Shortlist Solo Expo PHest via PHmuseum (UK – 2019), Nomination International Color Awards (USA – 2019), Selection Athens Photofestival (Greece – 2019), Selection Women Grant via Phmuseum(UK – 2019), Nomination International Photography Grant (2019), Selection Addis Fotofest (Ethiopia – 2020), Nomination International Color Awards (USA – 2020). [Official Website] [Print Edition]

Let’s begin with your initial encounter with the ‘International UFO congress in Phoenix’. An event that aims to bring together a multitude of people who believe in the existence of alien life. Before I even begin to discuss the images themselves, you mentioned that it was like entering a new universe, ‘A subculture where spaceships, contacts by creatures from other dimensions, space travel and abduction are part of the believer’s reality’. Could you elaborate on your experience within this event and was this the initial trigger for your interest in creating a project about alien life?   

The motivation for my story was a personal experience I had at the age of 10. I was raised at the Flemish countryside in the province of Antwerp. I remember that one cold December night, I was walking back home from a friends’ house with my mom. I was always watching the stars because my dad taught me so. I saw this light moving, coming from the south and going in north western direction. It looked like a star but in movement. We walked further along the road and I saw the star was still moving. When we arrived in front of our house, I looked up again and saw that this ‘star’ was now an object. It wasn´t an airplane because it had an oval shape and I could see the metallic grey color. There were also windows or lights around and what impressed me the most was that there was no sound at all. My dad gave me this book called “Chariots of the Gods” by swiss amateur archeologist Erich Von Däniken. I was reading about the Nazca lines and the Mexican pyramids at the age of 10 so my friends thought I was kind of strange.

Since I live in Mexico City and work as a photographer I have been interested in beliefs. Recently I am more passionate about the more magical beliefs. I was looking for more stories so at some point I was thinking back about this experience I had at the age of 10. So, I decided to do a series about believers with interesting stories. I heard there was a big UFO conference happening in Phoenix so I thought it was a good idea to start my research there. I thought that if I would share my story, people would open up and share their own stories. But this wasn´t true at all. I felt there was a lot of mystery and secrecy surrounding the event and an always underlying fear for not being taken seriously. 

They even had closed rooms where people felt safe to share their – sometimes scary experiences – under the guidance of a therapist specialized in abduction matters.

So back home in Mexico City I decided to start my journey here and look for contacts. I went to visit Jaime Maussan, Mexico’s most famous UFO journalist and then contacted the director of MUFON Mexico, Ruben Uriarte, who put me in contact with a lot of his contacts. So, this way it was easier for me to interview people and I could finally start my series.

Peña de Bernal in Querétaro is a UFO hotspot.

Being a landscape photographer, I was of course very interested in the many landscape images that were part of this collection of photographs. One image in Particular titled: ‘Whirlwind on the road in Texas’ caught my eye. In many science fiction films, we are presented with the reality of an alien landscape as ‘barren’ or ‘desolate’. An environment that is somewhat unforgiving of course adds to the action pact scrips of films like ‘Interstellar’ and ‘Blade Runner’. Is the idea of capturing these barren landscapes an extension of the ‘unknown’ and somewhat ‘scary’ perception of alien worlds? 

I took this picture while driving a rental car from El Paso to Marfa. Somewhere between Van Horn and Marfa I saw this impressive sight of a whirlwind. I am quite fascinated by the desert, for me it is so different from what I am used to. I decided to include this picture in my series although it is not a specific ufo site, for me the whole desert is kind of magical, where you can image these things could happen. Later in my research it all made sense. Several people I had interviewed had talked about the Bible and especially the part of Ezequiel where he describes his vision. Many believers see this as a proof of the existence of ufo’s. In other texts I found that what Ezequiel saw was in fact a whirlwind. Another person told me that UFO’s are often hidden inside whirlwinds so this picture made completely sense to her. 

Whirlwind on the road in Texas, somewhere between Van Horn and Marfa.

When we think about a community that believes in subjects like Alien life and conspiracy theories revolving around this topic we sometimes associate these individuals with an extremist way of viewing a particular part of life. The irony being that the rest of us find this way of thinking about alien life, well… ‘Alien’. Could you possibly tell us a little about your conversations with those individuals from the ‘International UFO Congress in Phoenix’. And possibly some of the stories that they might have shared with you regarding the notion of life outside planet earth?  

Yes, maybe all these stories they tell me sound quite weird but I want to gather the stories they tell me without judgement because finally it is all about their experiences.

When I went back to the Phoenix International UFO Congress last year, I could already make some contacts in advance. I was especially interested in abduction and wanted to understand the psychology behind. According to the Roper Poll survey, 4 million persons think they have been abducted and this is in the States alone. So, I was quite curious about that. I talked to Kathleen Marden, a MUFON investigator and niece of Betty Hill. The Betty and Barney Hill case is the first widely published report of alien abduction in the United States. Kathleen mentioned me that abductions in the beginning were rather arbitrary; aliens picked out people randomly in rural areas or on abandoned roads. But that they became more interested in the offspring of the abductees and then their grandchildren. Kathleen told me that she and her mother had been abducted several times. 

I also talked to a man selling what he called MADAR, an application that you can connect at home and that will warn you when there are anomalies in the geomagnetic field, so you would have a higher change of taking that picture of a UFO. 

Picture of a UFO taken by Raúl in 1993 in Ocotlan, Jalisco.

In your project brief you stated that: “is an ongoing series about the belief in alien species and how people construct their own world and perceptions”. The latter portion of this statement is what interests me as it relates to the empty streets and desolate cities found throughout your collection of images titled: ‘COVID-19 Pandemic’. It is both fascinating and scary to think that busy cities have now become barren landscapes and the idea of the ‘alien’ landscape came true to a certain extent… Is there a possibility that we will see you merge both projects together and combine how people construct their own world and perceptions with regards to the virus itself? 

I don´t think there is really a link between the series about the pandemic and this series about believers. I started the series of the pandemic more out of frustration because I felt locked inside the house, felt alone and wanted to take pictures again. So I started to take pictures of friends living close by.

Could you possibly tell us a little bit about the story behind ‘Jessica’s abduction experience’ and how you came about to photograph her in such a way? Out of all the images in this series, I found this photograph to be the most intense visually. 

I met Jessica through a mutual friend and UFO researcher. I first met up with her for a drink in the city center. We talked a couple of hours about her experience. She wanted to participate but didn’t want to show her face. She told her story, that she went to bed and woke up quickly. She saw 3 grey aliens in her room, 2 at the end of the bed and one under her. She talked also about a device in the room with blue lights on it that was scanning her body. She couldn’t move nor speak during this whole experience so that scared her. When the aliens left, the room was illuminated with a red light. So that is how I got this idea of taking her picture in a red illuminated room. I started taking pictures of her sitting on her bed. But then she told me she wanted to show me the exact position while she was lying in the bed. So, that is how I ended up with this picture. 

Jessica´s abduction experience in Mexico City.

Concluding this interview, could you tell us a little bit about your current situation, are you planning on travelling soon or continuing this project further? If so, are you most likely going to further this documentation in Mexico City, or travel to various other conventions and meet more people who believe in Alien life?  

I haven´t been able to take more picture for this series because every interview implies travelling within or outside the city and because of covid I didn´t feel very secure to do that. I am currently working on a photobook. I started a workshop called “incubadora de fotolibro” last year in collaboration with Hydra, a photo center in Mexico City. I hope to have my final dummy in the next month. And I am already thinking about several other series related to the same theme.  

Raúl had an encounter with a UFO in 1993 in Ocotlan, Jalisco. Since that time, he has vitiligo, a skin disease. His dog also changed color.

More Stories

Documentary Photography; Small Things by Binh-Dang

Documentary Photography; Small Things by Binh-Dang

There is a house by the sea 120km from Hanoi called Thien Giao. In this house the occupant’s heartbeat beats in unison for one hope, the hope that they will all be able to love and be loved. I visited this house one year ago
The Last Days of Art by Raju Peddada

The Last Days of Art by Raju Peddada

Art Shay, the master visual diarist of America, passed away exactly a year ago. His gargantuan library of photographs, almost two million, were sifted once again, by his indefatigable and loyal archivist: Ms. Erica DeGlopper, for some unpublished masterpieces.
The ancient culture of Mentawai by Matteo Maimone

The ancient culture of Mentawai by Matteo Maimone

In the middle of the rainforest on the island of Siberut, in the Mentawai archipelago, is one of the oldest and best preserved indigenous cultures in the world, discovered only around 1930, called Mentawai.
https://www.dodho.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/bannerpr.jpg

We invite you to participate in the first edition of the Portrait Photography Awards. Our call is open to any artistic interpretation of portrait photography.

https://www.dodho.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/BAnImage.jpg

ImageRights provides intelligent image search and copyright enforcement services to photo agencies and professional photographers worldwide.

https://www.dodho.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/mono2022.jpg

The best 100 images along with the winning images published in the yearly book “Monochromatic – Best Photographers of 2022”

Call For Entries #24 | After 23 editions and more than 100 published photographers, our print edition has proven to be a simply effective promotional channel.

Portrait of the Matterhorn by Nenad Saljic

Portrait of the Matterhorn by Nenad Saljic

The Matterhorn is a product of geological processes that transcend our concept of time. It was born from the remnants of an enormous African rock mass which originated more than 250 million years ago
Errance Urbaine by Xavier Rey

Errance Urbaine by Xavier Rey

The work of Xavier Rey is in the early years focused on landscape photography, mainly in long exposure and tends more and more to be part of a research and study on blur.
Iceland by Elena Cremona

Iceland by Elena Cremona

The argument of nature’s resource exploitation and excavation, as well as the destruction and environmental devastation of landscapes, has long been one of high concern. However the environmental effects of this are not always so visible or apparent.
Lost America by Matthew Portch

Lost America by Matthew Portch

Lost America examines a quiet stillness in a forgotten landscape that is, in a sense: ‘on-pause'. Backwater towns and rural corners are juxtaposed against the ambiguity of isolated suburbia.
Gone fishing by Michel Petillo

Gone fishing by Michel Petillo

May 19 2014 and the fishing season draws slowly to an end. The once bountiful North Atlantic no longer provides the tens of tons of daily catch for the local fishermen of Røst.
Charles Darwin Centre; Things in Jars by Peter Dazeley

Charles Darwin Centre; Things in Jars by Peter Dazeley

The wonderful bottled specimens seen here were all photographed in the charles Darwin Centre, part of the Natural History Museum in London.
Huésped by Diego Moreno

Huésped by Diego Moreno

I grew up in a family environment where domestic violence is one of the most marked circumstances in my life, the same setback that has made me constantly migrate.
Khayelitsha Township  by Florence Gallez

Khayelitsha Township by Florence Gallez

Created during Apartheid as a dormitory area for migratory workers, Khayelitsha is today the largest and youngest black township in Western Cape, located on the Cape Flats in the city of Cape Town.
The presence of an absence by Rafael Navarro

The presence of an absence by Rafael Navarro

This series of photographs was born as a heartfelt tribute to the great Mexican teacher whom I had the privilege of meeting.
Artistic portraits and imaginary worlds of Rebecca Massey

Artistic portraits and imaginary worlds of Rebecca Massey

Then I started exploring photography as a medium to create artistic portraits because I was never too interested in documentary photography.
Interview with Ann Prochilo; published in our print edition #20

Interview with Ann Prochilo; published in our print edition #20

Ann Prochilo brings extraordinary dreams of mixed elements, and thoughtful reflections to her images, being in the intersection of different worlds but still connected to her roots. Her surprising works are the result of a striking and complex process of work and way of thinking while trying to have her feet on the ground with everyday questioning about which is her place in the universe.
Just Small Hiccups by Anni Hanén

Just Small Hiccups by Anni Hanén

My father once told me that my world is like a black and white image, but I guess my heart has found it ́s own colours. I began my Just Small Hiccups story after I moved back to my childhood home with my own family.
Venus Without Mars Without Venus by Irvin Rivera

Venus Without Mars Without Venus by Irvin Rivera

Venus Without Mars Without Venus is an ongoing personal project that is loosely inspired by Italian Renaissance painter Sandro Boticelli’s painting of “Venus and Mars.” 
Fashion; Glamour photography of Ludek Ciganek

Fashion; Glamour photography of Ludek Ciganek

I was born in Trebic, Czech Republic, where I also currently live. Photography has fascinated me even as a child, ever since my father allowed me to handle his film SLR camera
Scroll down by Damien Berney

Scroll down by Damien Berney

Every minute 1 920 000 photos are taken in the world. Every minute 527 760 photos are shared on Snapchat. Every minute 347 222 photos are shared on WhatsApp. Every minute 243 055 photos are shared on Facebook. 
May You Stay Forever Young by Elie Monferier

May You Stay Forever Young by Elie Monferier

Night after night, I take my compact camera, I hold it at arm's length and I sink in the dark bars, in the infamous perfumes of the street, I seek the fragments of the bodies, the frailties, the hopes, the sounds of the glasses that we drink.

Featured Stories

Boxing; Muay Thai kids by Alain Schroeder

Boxing; Muay Thai kids by Alain Schroeder

Muay Thai kids project was selected and published in our print edition 20. Far from Thailand’s iconic tourist destinations, Isaan, the kingdom’s largest region, reaches north and east to the borders of Laos and Cambodia.
The Land Where the Roots Grow Deep by Rebecca Moseman

The Land Where the Roots Grow Deep by Rebecca Moseman

This series of photographs is part of an ongoing project about the African American people living in the deep south.
180 beats per minute by Ivaylo Yorgov

180 beats per minute by Ivaylo Yorgov

180 beats per minute’ celebrates the determination of the millions of runners around the globe who push through sweat and tears to achieve their goals.
Waiting Girls by Sadegh Souri

Waiting Girls by Sadegh Souri

In Iran, death penalty is given to the children for the crimes such as murder, drug trafficking, and armed robbery. According to the Islamic Penal Law, the age when girls are held accountable for their crimes is 9 years old, while the international conventions have banned the death penalty for individuals under 18.
Monologue about Chernobyl by Raúl Moreno

Monologue about Chernobyl by Raúl Moreno

A few kilometers from Chernobyl, there is a radioactive atmosphere that can not be seen but can intuit it. Food contaminated by Cesium 137 and Strontium, these inhabitants consume daily making radioactive isotopes are deposited in their bodies gradually.
Fishshot by Javier Corso

Fishshot by Javier Corso

Fishshot is a documentary project about loneliness, emotional isolation, and sentimental repression in Finnish society. These problems go further when the people start drinking to fight against them. The excessive consumption of alcohol is present in more than half cases of suicide, homicide and gender violence.
Growing in Darkness by Mário Macilau

Growing in Darkness by Mário Macilau

Mário Macilau is a photographer who works with “the ghosts of society” – socially isolated groups and subcultures – activating subjects and their stories though his psychologically sensitive yet loaded photographic lens.
Heroes by Erberto Zani

Heroes by Erberto Zani

Acid attack survivors in Bangladesh. In Bangladesh most of the people called them “monsters” or, sometimes, “victims”. But they prefer to be considered “survivors”. For me are heroes.
Ape dumma – Open your eyes by Czuko Williams

Ape dumma – Open your eyes by Czuko Williams

There is an strong untold story among the ancient tribes who lives in Ethiopia. The story of the loss of traditional way of life due the process of deculturation, transculturation, and mainly because of progress.
Photo manipulation by Sulaiman Almawash

Photo manipulation by Sulaiman Almawash

Photo manipulation is a mix of photography and graphic design. Combining lot of elements and create an unique image. It requires lot of creative skills, is a great source for inspiration and its always great fun and joy when you work on particular concept.
Living with albinism; Nude by Justine Tjallinks

Living with albinism; Nude by Justine Tjallinks

Living with albinism not only means an absence of pigmentation in the skin and hair, but also impairment in vision.
architectural photography of Julia Anna Gospodarou

architectural photography of Julia Anna Gospodarou

Architect and International Award-Winning B&W Fine Art Photographer, Julia lives in Athens and has a passion for both architecture and photography, doing them with the same dedication and joy.
Guatemala; Until the corn Grows Back by Lys Arango

Guatemala; Until the corn Grows Back by Lys Arango

Until the corn Grows Back; Lys Arango’s project was selected and published in our print edition 16. Criminal violence in Central America was something that happened very far away and that explained, according to the media, the gigantic caravans of migrants that from 2017 began to travel thousands of kilometres to reach the United States
To The Northwest by Giacomo Infantino

To The Northwest by Giacomo Infantino

His research is based on the in-depth narrative of those places in my province, those peripheral sites to which he has devoted his attention and constant attendance.
The Nenets by Sara Bianchi

The Nenets by Sara Bianchi

The Nenets are an ethnic minority with fewer than 50.000 people dedicated to reindeer breeding. They live in Yamal peninsula, Siberia. Yamal in the language of the indigenous means "the end of the world"
Dancing in the Rain by Suvobroto Ray Chaudhuri

Dancing in the Rain by Suvobroto Ray Chaudhuri

Darjeeling has always been a place of attraction in my life. A small Hill station located at an altitude of 2042 meter changed my thinking about rain in our life. In my life I always used to run for shelter with the rain.

Trending Stories

Altagracia by Santiago Vidal

Altagracia by Santiago Vidal

The Altagracia Day is a national holiday in the island of La Hispaniola, which is shared by the Dominican Republic and Haiti. This day is celebrated by around 20 million of the island’s inhabitants.
I-57 by Paul Elledge

I-57 by Paul Elledge

I grew up attending church on Sunday morning and attending motorsports Sunday evening. In an attempt to visualize the emotions and experience of those magical Sunday evenings of my youth I started the project I-57.
Commuting by Lilyan Aloma

Commuting by Lilyan Aloma

It is of great significance that the word ‘commute’ has an added meaning; to commute is to change one kind of payment or obligation for another, that being the underlying factor in my becoming a commuter passenger.
Rainier School by Steve Davis

Rainier School by Steve Davis

The Rainier School is a state operated institution for the developmentally disabled, not far from Seattle at the base of beautiful Mount Rainier. The school at the Rainier School disappeared years ago.
Acid Survivors by Jan Møller Hansen

Acid Survivors by Jan Møller Hansen

Acid attacks in Bangladesh are usually the result of land disputes, rejected marriage proposals, refusal or inability to pay dowry, resistance of being trafficked as sex worker or simply the desire for revenge.
No man´s land by Tine Poppe

No man´s land by Tine Poppe

Around 3000 rejected and "non-returnable" asylum seekers live in Norwegian asylum reception centres. They remain in an indefinite limbo situation for several years, without permission to work, no right to essential medical care and no possibility to leave for another country.
Emily Dickinson by Roberto De Mitri

Emily Dickinson by Roberto De Mitri

You cannot know what dimension was…  In which edge of dimension Emily is living… Secret Garden, Limbo or Purgatory. Whatever existence it was, she was there… 
Ship breaking and building by Steven Kruit

Ship breaking and building by Steven Kruit

The construction of the vessels is impressive as its mostly done by manual human manpower. Its plain muscle strength that is building these big vessels, some of the as large as 150 meters long and as high as a 20 storied building.
Light,composition and atmosphere of Jack Burger

Light,composition and atmosphere of Jack Burger

I’m a photographer living in the south of the Netherlands. Interesting images have always had my attention since I can remember. Analog photography was never really my thing. The digital camera was a real libaration for me with photoshop as my darkroom.
Involvement with nature; Surroundings by Ulla Von Czékus

Involvement with nature; Surroundings by Ulla Von Czékus

The Surroundings series arose from the experience of my involvement with nature, I wanted to play being a tree, being a plant, I wanted to be part of it. I am part of the whole, I am not one thing and nature another.
To The Moon and Home by Thomas H.P. Jerusalem

To The Moon and Home by Thomas H.P. Jerusalem

July 1969 - Lena and Denisa were enthusiastic and glued to the black and white TV watching the live broadcast of the Apollo 11 moonlanding... I don’t think there is a memory more burned into my brain than that of Apollo 11
Emptiness by Emmanuel Monzon

Emptiness by Emmanuel Monzon

The work of Emmanuel Monzon focuses primarily on the idea of urban sprawling and the urban expansion of its periphery. Monzon photographs urban banality as though it were a romantic painting, trying only to be “stronger than this big nothing” in controlling the space by framing the subject.

Other Stories

stay in touch
Join our mailing list and we'll keep you up to date with all the latest stories, opportunities, calls and more.
We use Sendinblue as our marketing platform. By Clicking below to submit this form, you acknowledge that the information you provided will be transferred to Sendinblue for processing in accordance with their terms of use
We’d love to
Thank you for subscribing!
Submission
Dodho Magazine accepts submissions from emerging and professional photographers from around the world.
Their projects can be published among the best photographers and be viewed by the best professionals in the industry and thousands of photography enthusiasts. Dodho magazine reserves the right to accept or reject any submitted project. Due to the large number of presentations received daily and the need to treat them with the greatest respect and the time necessary for a correct interpretation our average response time is around 5/10 business days in the case of being accepted.
- Between 10/30 images of your best images, in case your project contains a greater number of images which are part of the same indivisible body of work will also be accepted. You must send the images in jpg format to 1200px and 72dpi and quality 9. (No borders or watermarks)
- A short biography along with your photograph. (It must be written in the third person)
- Title and full text of the project with a minimum length of 300 words. (Texts with lesser number of words will not be accepted)
This is the information you need to start preparing your project for its presentation
To send it, you must compress the folder in .ZIP format and use our Wetransfer channel specially dedicated to the reception of works. Links or projects in PDF format will not be accepted. All presentations are carefully reviewed based on their content and final quality of the project or portfolio. If your work is selected for publication in the online version, it will be communicated to you via email and subsequently it will be published.
Contact
How can we help? Got an idea or something you'd like share? Please use the adjacent form, or contact contact@dodho.com
Thank You. We will contact you as soon as possible.
Submission
Dodho Magazine accepts submissions from emerging and professional photographers from around the world.
Their projects can be published among the best photographers and be viewed by the best professionals in the industry and thousands of photography enthusiasts. Dodho magazine reserves the right to accept or reject any submitted project. Due to the large number of presentations received daily and the need to treat them with the greatest respect and the time necessary for a correct interpretation our average response time is around 5/10 business days in the case of being accepted. This is the information you need to start preparing your project for its presentation.
To send it, you must compress the folder in .ZIP format and use our Wetransfer channel specially dedicated to the reception of works. Links or projects in PDF format will not be accepted. All presentations are carefully reviewed based on their content and final quality of the project or portfolio. If your work is selected for publication in the online version, it will be communicated to you via email and subsequently it will be published.
Get in Touch
How can we help? Got an idea or something you'd like share? Please use the adjacent form, or contact contact@dodho.com
Thank You. We will contact you as soon as possible.