Giya Makondo-Wills

Giya Makondo-Wills is a photographer, educator and talk show host based in The Netherlands. Her work began rooted in her documentary photography training and has evolved as our societal understanding of what it means to document has. Working across the still image, text, sound, archives and moving image, her stories stem from questions of identity, community, systems of power, and challenging dominant narratives. De-colonial and de centering Eurocentric modes of thinking are central to her practice, as is the preservation of the stories from the margins. 

In 2024, Makondo-Wills became a Magnum Foundation Fellow, and in 2022 she joined the FUTURES Photography network. Since 2021, she has been a lecturer in the BA Photography program at the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague since. She also runs guest workshops internationally and hosts the live talk show FOTODOK Book Talks at Tivoli Vredenburg.  

Since 2017 Makondo-Wills has collaborated on various projects internationally, participating in de-colonial exchanges with practitioners from various fields and served on juries and steering groups developing arts education and opportunities for marginalized artists. She has been commended for her work and regularly exhibited and published her work internationally.


World Press Photo Involvement:
Speaker at The Stories That Matter, part of the World Press Photo Days 2026

Giya Makondo-Wills on Social Media:
Instagram: @giyamakondowills