Dream Narratives, the Future of Cities, the Stories of Man

We have five excellent photo-narratives to present this week: a dreamy, cinematic sequence from the roads of France, two starkly different views on the future of cities, as well as two intensely personal projects, one showing the hell of addiction, the other presenting an emotional homecoming in Southeast Asia. We hope you dig in to all these stories and discover all that LensCulture has to offer. —Jim Casper and the whole team at LensCulture   On the Road, Dream Narrative There is no narrator for this dark, mysterious visual story — Is it a cinematic sequence of a child's memories, a dream, a diary, a nightmare? By Julien Magre   Future Cities It is estimated that by 2050, the world's squatter population will hit 3 billion—this series explores what life looks like in these informal, unplanned settlements that are growing across the world. By Noah Addis   Origins: A Return to the Far North Beyond the extreme cold, the endless nights, the blinding snow—the Alaskan landscape holds profound subtleties and wondrous, beautiful visions waiting to be (re)discovered. By Acacia Johnson   The Mekong: Stories of Man A powerful visual narrative that takes us along 4,200 km of Southeast Asia's longest river—and shows us the countless stories that can be found on its banks. By Lâm Duc Hiên   Heroin: the Limbo that precedes Hell An intensely personal short video of black-and-white still images, with poetic narration by the photographer. By Alberto García-Alix We would love to give a huge THANK YOU to everyone who submitted their work to the LensCulture Visual Storytelling 2014 competition. We saw an unprecedented surge of entries in the final days, which means we have an exciting and inspiring number of visual narratives to dig into.  We will be announcing the results by late November. While the competition is now closed to submissions, be sure to check out our Facebook albums, which feature SEVEN volumes of highlighted entrants. LensCulture on the Road The International Festival of Photography Rome, Italy Through January 11, 2015 At the MACRO (Museum of Contemporary Art in Rome) LensCulture Editor Jim Casper will be giving a presentation on Friday evening, Oct. 24th, and will then be reviewing portfolios on Saturday morning. If you are in Rome, stop by!