Universität der Künste Berlin (UdK)
B.A. Fine Arts — Photography & Media Art
Studio practice under Prof. Heidi Specker. Thesis series Nachtschichten: night portraits along the Ringbahn.
Pierre Dittes
Photographer working with light, grain, and the in-between.
Twenty-seven, based in Berlin. Portraits, street, and analog experiments.
About
I’m Pierre Dittes. I grew up between darkrooms and sketchbooks — first as a student of image-making, then as someone who couldn’t put the camera down. Photography is both my trained craft and the habit that still pulls me through Berlin’s streets at odd hours.
My work sits between commissioned portraiture and personal series: quiet faces, transit corridors, leftover light on concrete. I shoot digital when speed matters, and 35mm film when I want the photograph to argue back.
Curriculum vitae
Education
Abendgymnasium Leipzig — Gestaltung
Abitur with focus in Visual Arts & Design
Intensive drawing, darkroom printing, and introduction to documentary photography at the city’s art-oriented evening gymnasium.
Kunstgymnasium Dresden-Plauen
Secondary school with artistic profile
Foundation years in painting, composition, and analogue photography workshops — where the hobby became a direction.
Experience
Independent photographer
Portrait, editorial, and personal projects
Commissions for musicians, small publishers, and cultural spaces. Ongoing personal work on urban solitude and film grain as material.
Studio assistant — Atelier Nordlicht
Lighting, set prep, post-production
Assisted on fashion and still-life shoots; learned to read daylight in a controlled room and to keep a quiet set.
Darkroom technician — Fotokollektiv Ost
Community lab & workshop support
Maintained chemistry, taught intro sessions, and printed for group exhibitions in empty shop windows.
Selected exhibitions & mentions
- 2024 Grain & Concrete — group show, Kühlhaus Berlin
- 2023 Faces after Midnight — solo wall, Projektraum Kreuzberg
- 2022 UdK Jahresausstellung — selected thesis prints
- 2021 Feature in Der Greif guest-curated open call
Practice
The hobby never left — it just got louder. Between jobs I walk with a Leica M6 or a battered Contax, looking for scenes that feel almost unfinished.
- Portrait Soft directional light, room for silence, faces that keep a little distance.
- Street & transit U-Bahn platforms, rain on glass, the choreography of strangers.
- Analog process HP5, Tri-X, home development — grain as part of the sentence, not a filter.
Contact
Available for portrait sittings, editorial assignments, and collaborative projects in Berlin and beyond.
hello@pierredittes.de
Berlin, Germany