Disruptive Berlin is a subjective snapshot of the German capital’s mid-2010s ascent to a global tech startup hub, told through portraits of young companies, conferences, events, and business accelerators, all of which set out to “disrupt” existing industries. Centered on the city where Denny lives and works, Disruptive Berlin looks at how a city with no flagship industry to speak of became a European capital of tech business, attracting attention from Silicon Valley and beyond. Beginning when, around mid-2013, then-chancellor Angela Merkel visibly courted activity in the sector, early-stage tech companies have decamped to and sprung up across Berlin, launching conferences and hackathons and spawning an ecosystem rich with young founders (if not always rich with traditional venture capital).

Beginning with the eponymous exhibition at Galerie Buchholz in 2014, Disruptive Berlin draws from and dramatizes the visual cultures coming out of the city’s hyped identity as a startup hub, tracking the rhetoric and values of these companies – and the intrepid, ambitious, and in a word, disruptive founders, entrepreneurs, and bootstrappers who lead them.