Searches for ultra-high-energy photons at the Pierre Auger Observatory

One of the key challenges in astroparticle physics is identifying the sources of cosmic rays at the highest energies (above 10^18 eV). In this context, the search for ultra-high energy photons is of high interest. Observing photons of such energies would impact astrophysics and particle physics as well as fundamental physics and would be an important contribution to multimessenger astronomy. The Pierre Auger Observatory near Malargue, Argentina, is the largest air-shower experiment for the detection of ultra-high energy cosmic rays. It consists of an array of about 1660 water Cherenkov detectors arranged on a triangular grid which covers an area of more than 3000 km^2. 27 fluorescence telescopes at four sites overlooking the detector array provide an independent and complementary method for air-shower detection. In the contribution, the various activities at the Pierre Auger Observatory concerning searches for ultra-high energy photons will be presented and the current results will be summarized.