Photoville is a free, family-friendly photography festival featuring 80 exhibits by local and international artists, on view from May 16 to May 30 in Brooklyn Bridge Park. In this guide, you’ll find everything you need to know: details on the Opening Weekend celebration at Emily Warren Roebling Plaza and a roundup of the most kid-friendly exhibits in Brooklyn Bridge Park.
The festival will kick off with a free Opening Weekend Community Celebration in Brooklyn Bridge Park on Saturday, May 16 and Sunday, May 17. The celebration will include family-friendly programming, as well as food and beverage vendors from Smorgasburg. Plus, on the evening of Saturday, May 16, there will be an evening celebration of music, community, and visual storytelling from 7.30-9pm.
Kids activities during Opening Weekend May
Cyantotypes Workshop | May 16, 12–2pm
This workshop invites participants to explore image-making through cyanotype, a cameraless photographic process that uses sunlight and photosensitive compounds to produce images in deep blue tones. Participants will work with medicinal herbs—such as lavender, sage, and rosemary—to create botanical photographs on fabric and cotton paper, exploring the forms and textures of plants.
The Junk Edit | May 16, 3-6pm
Create your own junk journal page with Sarai Garcia. Participants can cut, layer, and collage to make their own journal page. Rooted in play and creative freedom, this session offers a low-pressure space to slow down and work with your hands. All ages welcomed. No experience needed. Come and go as you like. All materials are provided.
Crafts with Creatively Wild | May 17, 12-5pm
Join us for a fun and hands-on craft session where creativity takes center stage! Surrounded by fresh air and good vibes, you’ll get to experiment with a variety of materials and make something uniquely your own. All ages and skill levels welcome—just bring your imagination!
Tintype Portrait Booth | May 16 + 17, 12-7pm
Have your portrait taken at Penumbra Foundation’s Tintype Portrait booth!
Kid-friendly Photoville exhibits in Brooklyn Bridge Park
Photoville offers a wide array of exhibits that families will love—here are just a few highlights!
LOVE, PEACE, POWER, FREEDOM: CLASSROOM PORTRAITS BY CENTRAL BROOKLYN YOUTH
This project is in dialogue with Dawoud Bey’s pedagogical portraiture practice, which treats portraiture as an act of dignity, listening, and self-authorship. Students engage this approach as a methodology, using the camera as a tool for care, reflection, and narrative agency. By photographing one another, the classroom becomes a shared space of looking, listening, and mutual recognition.
MADE IN NYC: MEET THE MAKERS
The Made in NYC: Meet the Makers series celebrates the brilliance, resilience, and innovation of Black, Indigenous, and People of Color entrepreneurs who are manufacturing right here in New York City. This body of work centers BIPOC-owned businesses and makers who are quite literally building their dreams—often against steep odds—within one of the most expensive and competitive cities in the world.
MISTY COPELAND’S FINAL BOW
For more than four decades, Henry Leutwyler has photographed the world of dance from the inside—backstage, in rehearsal, and in moments of quiet reckoning. This project centers on Misty Copeland, culminating in her final performance with American Ballet Theatre on October 22, 2025, commissioned by New York Magazine.
Wild Hope
Wild Hope illuminates the resilience of nature and humanity, offering hope, empathy, and a call to protect the living world.
Seeing Life Through a Bug’s Eyes
The realm of insects is right in front of our eyes, filled with kaleidoscopic characters flaunting vibrant colors and dramatic action. But it’s so minuscule, it’s easy to miss. When a Japanese photographer hacked his camera, he revealed a strange and curious scene right underfoot.
Our World Above and Below (Washington Street and Prospect Street)
By capturing the same thing from very different perspectives, a NASA astronaut and an intrepid photographer create a whole new way of seeing our world.
PUPPIES BEHIND BARS
For almost two years, photographers Ashley Gilbertson and Ava Pellor, came into the men’s maximum-security prison, Green Haven, to document Puppies Behind Bars. These photos trace the incarcerated “puppy raisers” and the puppies they are raising to become service dogs.
Birds of a Feather
Birds of a Feather is an interactive, large-scale outdoor book sculpture that reimagines Claire Rosen’s recent photography book featuring a series of portraits of live birds, set against opulent, historically inspired backdrops. This work takes the familiar intimacy of a book and expands it into an unexpected scaled object designed for collective engagement.
Odd Apples
Odd Apples is a celebration of the apple, a humble fruit whose unique wonders and idiosyncrasies are often overlooked and flattened by commercialization and commodification. The project documents the unusual, stunning, and strange world of apples outside of the grocery store.
FIGHT LIKE A GIRL
The women in this documentary series are, for the most part, defined as “Masters”. They participate in USA Boxing’s Master division as amateurs, age 40 and over. Most came to boxing later in life, after marriage, kids, careers, and other sports. Their reasons for boxing are as varied as the women themselves, but they all find meaning in combat, camaraderie and strategy.
Memorial ’76
I made these photographs on Memorial Day in 1976. The parade began on 25th Street and 5th Avenue, across the street from the entrance to Green-Wood Cemetery. I walked ten blocks from my apartment in pre-gentrified South Brooklyn and arrived in time to see marchers and musicians warm up and tune up. Because the 200th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence would take place in the summer of 1976, this year’s Memorial Day Parade was larger than usual, and included references to “America’s Birthday.” As I photographed the Parade, I took a slow walk through the Brooklyn I knew very well. Italian-, Puerto Rican-, Irish- and Polish- American community members participated as both marchers and observers.
FRAMING FATHERHOOD: A CELEBRATION OF BLACK FATHERS
Framing Fatherhood: A Celebration of Black Fathers began as an act of love, a deliberate counter-narrative to the stories so often told about Black fathers rather than by and for them. A love letter to Black men, their children, and the young people their love impacts. Through the lenses of 15 prominent Black male photographers, this exhibition captures timeless tenderness, unapologetic vulnerability, the intimate moments between father and child, and the love that legacies leave.
A QUESTION OF BALANCE
As the American Southwest endures the worst drought in 1,200 years, A Question of Balance shares a story of a water supply divided along racial lines. Water is not taken for granted in the Navajo Nation—the largest Native reservation in the United States. “We must prioritize humans, not corporations. Prioritize balance.”
