We started February 2025 by welcoming 25 curious minds from Poland, Czechia, Hungary and Ukraine to Rzeszów, all of them ready to look at the world from a different perspective. From the very beginning, the “Picture the Future” project was meant to be more than just another youth exchange. The starting point was the 17 Sustainable Development Goals, but instead of focusing on definitions, we chose to explore how these ideas actually exist in everyday life and where they can be found in our immediate surroundings.
The first days were about getting to know each other, sharing experiences and slowly building trust. Different languages, backgrounds and perspectives quickly started to blend, and what connected everyone was a shared curiosity and openness to ask questions. Those initial conversations soon became the foundation for everything that followed.
Photography became our main working tool, not as a technical skill, but as a way of seeing. During visual storytelling workshops, participants learned how to tell stories through images, and then went out into the city to look for those stories in real life. Working in international teams, they observed places, people and everyday situations that reflected themes such as equality, responsible consumption or environmental awareness. Sometimes these were obvious examples, but often they were things easy to overlook unless you stop and take a closer look.
The result was a collection of very different photographs, each one an attempt to answer the same question: what do the Sustainable Development Goals mean to us, and how do they relate to our daily choices? At the same time, something else was happening within the group. What started as a group of strangers gradually turned into a close and supportive community. Shared experiences, conversations and simply spending time together made relationships grow naturally and authentically.
By the end of the project, it became clear that “Picture the Future” was not just about workshops or photography, but about an experience that stays with participants beyond those few days. Photography became a starting point for reflection and dialogue, while the Sustainable Development Goals stopped being abstract concepts and gained a very real and personal meaning.
The project was made possible thanks to the financial support of the European Union under the Erasmus+ programme, which creates opportunities for young people to meet, exchange experiences and grow beyond borders. The exchange was carried out in cooperation with partners from Czechia, Hungary, Ukraine and Poland, and its outcomes went far beyond photographs, including new perspectives, connections and experiences that participants take with them further.
For a few days, Rzeszów became a meeting point of different stories, viewpoints and sensitivities, and for many, the beginning of something that will continue to grow.
