• They are stories about war and destruction. One can read with horror that IS even hide booby traps in teddy-bears. The stories also tell about courage and confidence. (Süddeutsche Zeitung about exhibition “Erschüttert”)
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  • Till Mayer does not conceal the horror of war. Instead, he always portrays soldiers fighting in this war as human beings. (Obermain-Tagblatt about the book “Donbas – Europe’s forgotten war”)
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  • Moreover, his prose notes proves him as a critical micro-historian. Using ordinary people as examples, he shows aspects of worldwide dismay. (Süddeutsche Zeitung about the book „Dunkle Reisen“)
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  • Those, who feel numb to death tolls in the news or to floods of horrific images in the media, may get touched by this kind of portraits, and may start to take a moment and think. (Main-Post about the new book: Dunkle Reisen (Dark Journeys)
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  • Till Mayer tells the stories of his protagonists on boards with black-and-white photographs and texts on them. Terror is immediately personified. All that is abstract dissolves. The collective tragedies are given personal faces. It is unpleasant to see these people but still it is necessary. (Süddeutsche Zeitung, 4th July 2016)
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  • “With his reports and pictures, Till Mayer has helped countless people who were in great need”, says Uli Brenner at the end of his laudatory speech to explain the jury’s decision. “He has done so much good in order to fight the suffering in the world that it makes me want to call out to him: ‘Don’t worry about the professional distance.’ Mayer is a part of all the projects he does, with heart and soul.” (Obermain-Tagblatt)
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  • Uli Brenner, member of the jury and former head of the “Deutsche Journalistenschule”, described Till Mayer’s work as “powerful”. Brenner said that he had always believed in the dogma of objectivity concerning his profession and that he had thought it was impossible to be a journalist and commit oneself to something at the same time. “And then I heard about a certain Till Mayer.” (Mainpost)
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  • His photographs clearly differentiate from reporting on crises in a voyeuristic way. There are no paintings of battle scenes; instead, the victims are given a “face”. Touching, upsetting, but still unobtrusive. (Obermain-Tagblatt, 23. Mai 2015)
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  • Till Mayer won the Coburg Media Award 2015 (“Coburger Medienpreis 2015″) for his cross-media exhibition project “Barriere:Zonen”. The Coburg Media Club (“Medienclub Coburg”) has awarded this price for the fifth time in the categories of “young talent”, “creation” and “breaking waves”.
    Obermain-TageblattITVTVOinFranken
  • Till Mayer travels to areas affected by war when other journalists are long gone. He focuses on the aftereffects of war. (Nordbayern.de, 24. November 2014)
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  • “barrier:zones” is an exhibition with impressive photos in black and white showing strong people who manage to live their lives surrounded by barriers. They have been even able to overcome some of these barriers, the remaining ones are going to demand a great deal of them. All the portraits have one thing in common: “They demand respect”, says Till Mayer. (Fränkischer-Tag, 18. November 2014)
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  • For years, Till Mayer has been travelling to areas affected by war or crisis all over the world. Returning to the local news office he works in, everyday life is totally different. However, the pictures of the war victims he has met will always stay in his mind. (Fridablogger der Hanns-Seidel-Stiftung)
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  • He is a “shaker”. His reports upset, shake up and get things moving. His journalistic contributions dealing with highly charged topics create a stir. Thus, he gets to a meta level of journalism. He does not only shed light on topics, but he sets things in motion. (Bamberger Online-Zeitung, 2. März 2012)
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  • The girl swallows hard and whispers: “Oh my God!” A picture of a starving child is shown on the screen. The picture immediately shows its effect: there is an awkward silence in the school canteen of “Leonhard-Wagner-Gymnasium” in Schwabmünchen. The man standing in the front calmly lets his gaze wander around the audience before he starts to tell the story of the boy in the picture. (Augsburger-Allgemeine, 10. November 2011)
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  • With precise language and persistent motifs, Mayer steers our view away from the battlefields with the anonymous dead to the suffering of individuals. Whether young victims of the civil war in Sierra Leone or the 80-year-old German who has never overcome the death of his father during the Second World War, Mayer miraculously expresses such experiences not as horror, but as vulnerability, resulting from a deeply felt sense of humanity. (Bayerische Staatszeitung, München, 1. Oktober 2010)
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  • The photographer and writer Till Mayer lifts eleven war victims from the fog of anonymity which normally surrounds them. He gives them a face and records their stories – with haunting images and text. (Münchner Merkur, 30. September 2010)
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  • It’s an arduous book. Till Mayer shows in eleven portraits what war leaves behind when the guns fall silent – all over the world. People without prospects, battered country, hunger, suffering. (Spiegel-Online, Hamburg, 29. September 2010)
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  • Touching pictures and interviews from persons still injured is what Till Mayer has brought back from his journey into the past. (Donaukurier, Ingolstadt, 20./21. März 2008)
  • He takes his photos without voyeurism. He achieves to show deep feelings and sympathy with his words and pictures. (Der Neue Tag, Weiden, 4. Dezember 2007)
  • With short but touching texts about the experiences of his interview partners Till Mayer draws an image of tyranny which could not be more vivid. (Neue Presse, Coburg, 24. November 2007)
  • Therefore, there was plenty of praise for the 35-year-old Mayer, who combines pictures and features to show the unthinkable with discretion. (Bayerische Staatszeitung, München, 9. November 2007)
  • Texts and photos by Till Mayer, a young journalist, who has been able on behalf of the Red Cross to be in many places on this earth. Being an active chronicler of misery, he has photographed the untold suffering of war victims and refugees. (Süddeutsche Zeitung, München, 2. November 2007)
  • The author and photographer Till Mayer from Bamberg has over many years managed to give both a face and a voice to victims, henceforth stirring people´s consciences worldwide. (Fränkischer Tag, Bamberg, 25. August 2007)
  • With the help of his camera, Till Mayer has the gift for catching tragedy in the moment of last hope. With his silent but intensive portraits his work is the opposite of the ubiquitous voyeurism of contemporary war journalism with its pictures of bombs flashing and children’s corpses. (Nürnberger Zeitung, 9. August 2007)
  • Till Mayer succeeds with empathy in writing sensitive portraits. He builds a bridge between then and now. Very impressive are his large black-and-white portrait photos taken of partners he interviewed. (Nordbayerischer Kurier, Bayreuth, Juni 2007)
  • As a photographer, he tells such stories, but he never tells them in a lurid or spectular way. He does not focus on starved bodies. One should see that “his” people are humans with emotions. (Badische Zeitung, Freiburg, 25. Oktober 2006)
  • Till Mayer works with the suggestive effects of black and white photos. He pays special attention to those, who normally are overlooked. … an aesthetic viewpoint in a world of horror. (Süddeutsche Zeitung, München, 27./28. Dezember 2003)
  • Till Mayer’s photos creep under your skin. These are pictures that you are not able to forget soon. They don`t shock you like many media-reports about wars and disasters. Rather they touch you because they are cautious and unobtrusive. (Fränkischer Tag, Bamberg, 19. August 2004)
  • You really need to see it. It is not easy to describe this exhibition, because it is too tragic and at the same time too humane. Till Mayer is able to do what a good photographer should, he captures the moment when expressions come alive or change, when a smile keeps tragedy away or joy is spoiled by crying. (Morgunbladid, Reykjavik, März 2001)
  • Till Mayer has converted his 50 digital prints into black and white, ,,colour distracts”. His photos touch d eeply. With respect and pain they show closely how victims survive in poverty and war – a ceasefire-zone. (Abendzeitung, Nürnberg, 19. August 2004)
  • He is a tough guy with sharp edges and strong enough to endure, when he gives offence with his views. And he continues fighting for the forgotten. (Nürnberger Nachrichten, Nürnberg, 18. März 2003)
  • His photos are not gigantic war paintings. In the faces of the portrayed Till Mayer catches the the suffering during times of war. (Prinz, Nürnberg, September 2003)
  • One of the photos shows th e power of love, which for a moment makes the suffering bearable. With a gentle glance a mother feeds her son, who was seriously wounded by a rocket attack in Afghanistan. (Die Welt, Berlin, 13. Mai 1997)