Ones to Watch 2025 – Linda Zhengová

Every 12 months, BJP publishes its Ones to Watch subject – our choice of the artists who epitomise the expertise and creativity in worldwide pictures at the moment, as nominated by a worldwide community of curators, editors, and artists.

As we finalise this 12 months’s listing, to be revealed in Issue 7926, to be revealed this June, we’re revisiting the 2025 Ones to Watch. Today, Linda Zhengová, as nominated by Alex Blanco.

“A close friend told me over drinks that whenever she was photographed, she felt like a piece of furniture. Something to be looked at, not seen,” says Linda Zhengová. “So I asked her to let me photograph her the way she wanted, and in that moment, I saw something incredibly raw and pure. From then on, that pursuit of authenticity became my signature, and my obsession.” 

A Czech-Chinese photographer, curator and author, Zhengová’s work delves into sexuality and repression, motherhood and trauma. Known for capturing encounters with strangers, she additionally images shut buddies; both manner, her goal is to query conference and seize one thing actual. “Sex has become a commodity, and now we’re being sold the false impression that intimacy can be too,” she explains. “There’s an explosion of fabricated intimacy – hourly husbands, AI companions, ‘girlfriend experiences’ – as if closeness is something you can buy. So once we see a depiction of real intimacy, it pricks us, touches us and perhaps even disturbs us.”

Born in 1995, Zhengová largely grew up within the Czech Republic, visiting China each summer season. Her mother and father gave her a digicam when she was 15, however discouraged her from learning it additional; transferring to the Netherlands to take up a level in diplomacy, she felt “like I was missing a limb”. She ended up enrolling in a pictures BA anyway, pursuing the 2 topics aspect by aspect, and one in all her college initiatives was KULISHEK (2018), a take a look at her mother and father’ uncommon relationship. They met in Moscow in 1989, however had been compelled aside when the Soviet Union collapsed and, dreaming of a reunion, exchanged a whole lot of letters and pictures. They ended up residing separate lives, however stay married to today.