Bologna
A completed LUMINA Experience with daily assignments and image review.
Nine working days of daily photographic assignments, shooting in markets, workshops and streets — and image review with Per every evening.
A city where you must find the photograph yourself.
Bologna is chosen because it offers very different photographic situations within walking distance: covered porticoes with hard lines of light and shadow, markets with pace and unpredictability, workshops where people work with their hands, and streets where the light moves hour by hour.
That makes it possible to apply the same principles to very different assignments — and to return to the same corner at another time of day and see what the light changes.
We photograph people, craft, markets and everyday Bologna. We use the city to work in — it is not the product itself.
Nine working days with specific assignments.
You photograph every day. Each day carries an assignment with a clear photographic purpose — an environment, a challenge and something specific to work on. You solve it alone and with the group, select your images, and we review them together in the evening.
Along the way we work with how composition, movement and rhythm change the way an image is experienced — how the eye travels through the frame, and why one light, one angle or one moment makes a stronger photograph than another.
- 01
Living craft
People who work with their hands — and the rooms their work shapes.
- 02
The environmental portrait
The portrait as an encounter. A person seen in context, not in front of a backdrop.
- 03
Markets and everyday life
Bologna's daily life in pace, noise and light — where the city stops posing.
- 04
Architecture and porticoes
Repetition, rhythm and line as narrative structure in the frame.
- 05
Light, shadow and texture
Light as feeling and atmosphere — not as technique or set-up.
- 06
Street photography and observation
Waiting, watching, recognising the moment before it happens.
- 07
Selection
Daily review and honest critique — the whole series before the single frame.
The same questions. New situations each day.
Everything in the Method comes back to one question: What is the photograph about? From there, you work on seeing the subject, sensing the mood, making deliberate choices, getting the timing right and recognising what you keep repeating.
In Bologna, the questions were used in concrete assignments and to build a coherent series.
How the work was structured.
The days share the same basic rhythm: a briefing and an assignment in the morning, photographing in the city, selection and editing, and a shared image review with feedback in the evening. The theme changes from day to day.
The programme may be adjusted along the way, for example because of the weather or light.
- Arrival
Arrival & meaning
We land in the city and in the method. Why do you photograph — and what are you actually looking for?
- Movement I
Seeing Bologna
The eye before the camera. We train observation before we begin to gather images.
- Movement II
Feeling & human encounter
Presence as a photographic tool. The meeting with a person becomes part of the picture.
- Movement III
Intention & craft
Deliberate choices. We work close to the craft and to what is made by hand.
- Movement IV
Rhythm & movement
The pace of the city, its repetitions and lines — and how the eye travels through the frame.
- Movement V
Identity & personal language
What you keep returning to is your language. We begin to give it form.
- Work I
THE THIRD DIMENSION
What stays with the viewer when the subject does not explain everything?
- Work II
Shadow and light
What does the light show, and what do you choose to leave hidden?
- Work III
Diagonals
How do direction and balance create tension in the photograph?
- Closing
Selection and series
We select photographs and bring them together as a series.
Bologna, seen through the method.
Bologna photographed in black and white. Here, light and shadow are the subject.
What it involves.
- Destination
- Bologna, Italy
- Dates
- 24 August – 2 September 2026
- Duration
- 10 days · 9 working days
- Group size
- Max. 12 participants
- Accommodation
- Zanhotel Europa · half board
- Status
- Registration closed
Included
- 9 days of photographic assignments
- Daily one-to-one guidance
- Daily image critique
- Work on selection and a series
- Hotel and half board: breakfast and dinner
Not included
- Travel to and from Bologna
- Lunch
- Drinks beyond what is included
- Travel insurance
- Personal expenses
- Single-room supplement (optional)
Price and payment plan are given at registration. A single room is available at a supplement.
Per Valentin.
Per Valentin is a photographer and the creator of THE LUMINA METHOD™ by Per Valentin. He cares less about technical tricks than about the choices you make before you press the shutter.
He is present throughout: he sets the daily assignment, photographs alongside the group in the city, looks at your selected images every evening and gives concrete feedback on your choices of subject, light, composition and timing.
My work is not to give you my pictures. My work is to help you find yours.
More about Per ValentinThe practical side.
Join the interest list
Hear about upcoming LUMINA formats, talks and photographic events with Per Valentin.
Bologna 2026.
LUMINA Experience Bologna took place 24 August – 2 September 2026. The next LUMINA Experience is Palermo, 1–9 March 2027, with a maximum of 12 participants.
Max 12 participants · One group in 2026