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Julian Vogel was born on November 16, 1985, in Frankfurt am Main. He studied film studies at the Free University of Berlin and directing at the Film Academy Baden-Württemberg, spending a guest semester at the Paris film school La Fémis.
Vogel's first short documentary, "Tilman im Paradies" ("Tilman in Paradise," 2011), portrays a client who falls in love with a sex worker. The film screened at the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam, among others, and won Best Documentary at the 2012 Landshut Short Film Festival. His feature-length debut, "Palast" (2013), examines the residents and planners of a prefabricated housing block. In "Bilder vom Flo" ("Flo's Pictures," 2016), he follows his best friend's search for the story of his father, who died unexpectedly at a young age; the film was screened at several festivals, including the 2016 Max Ophüls Prize Film Festival (Documentary Competition).
Vogel received wide recognition for his documentary trilogy "Einzeltäter", which focuses on people who lost relatives in the far-right attacks in Munich in 2016 (a shooting targeting young people with migrant backgrounds), Halle in 2019 (a synagogue shooting on Yom Kippur), and Hanau in 2020 (a shooting targeting shisha bars and cafés frequented by people from immigrant communities). Each film takes the name of the attack location: "Halle" (2022), "Hanau" (2023), and "München" (2023). The trilogy was shown at numerous festivals and won multiple awards, including the German Television Award, the Hessian Film Award, the Duisburg Film Week Prize, and the prestigious Grimme Award.
Together with Johannes Büttner, Vogel directed the documentary "Soldaten des Lichts" ("Soldiers of Light"), about miracle healers, esotericists, pandemic deniers, and influencers associated with Germany’s far-right scene, particularly the Reichsbürger ("Reich Citizens") movement, whose adherents reject the legitimacy of the modern German state and often promote conspiracy theories. The film premiered in April 2025 at the Visions du Réel festival in Nyon, Switzerland, and was released in German cinemas in August 2025.