Main Reasons To Apply To The PhMuseum Women Photographers Grant

From focusing on the way you present your work, to taking part in a possibly career-changing initiative, there are many motivations to submit your visual project to our open call for female and non-binary photographers.

Now in its 10th year of activity, the PhMuseum Women Photographers Grant is known for having recognized the work of visual practitioners among which Heba Khamis, Sanne De Wilde, Natalie Keyssar, Raphaela Rosella, Ana Vallejo, Myriam Boulos, Fabiola Cedillo, Rita Puig-Serra, Laura El-Tantawy, Ngadi Smart, Cédrine Scheidig, Sara Abbaspour, Lisa Elmaleh, Verdiana Albano, Marisol Mendez, and Sara De Brito Faustino.

Its former editions counted on jurors such as Damarice Amao (Centre Pompidou​), Alessandra Sanguinetti (Magnum Photo), Taous Dahmani (Les Rencontres d’Arles & The Eyes Magazine), Diana Markosian (Documentary Photographer, Writer, and Filmmaker), Donna Ferrato (Photographer), Pamela Chen (Instagram), Monica de Miranda (Visual Artist), Katy Hundertmark (Curator and Managing Editor of Foam Magazine), Anna Goldwater Alexander (WIRED), Renee Mussai (Autograph), River Bullock (MoMA), Gem Fletcher (Writer, Host of The Messy Truth podcast), Dilys Ng (TIME Magazine), Danae Panchaud (Museologist, Lecturer and Director Centre de la photographie Genève), Pixy Liao (Visual Artist), Amak Mahmoodian (Multidisciplinary Artist and Educator). Quality, credibility, and mutual support are values that we are striving to develop over time, as well as some of the many reasons why you might consider applying.

1. Join The Conversation

We start from this point every year because it's likely the most relevant. For 10 years, the PhMuseum Women Photographers Grant has brought together photographers across generations, geographies, and traditions. The PhMuseum Women Photographers Grant is not just about prizes. It's about joining a collective conversation and giving your contribution in sharing female and non-binary perspectives within an industry historically dominated by male professionals and their gaze. Every year, our open call represents an occasion to showcase works stimulating and renewing the debate. We are living a historical transition and every single application can matter.

To mark this milestone and deepen that very conversation, this year, in partnership with MPB, Europe's top camera reseller, we created 10 Years Of Female And Non-Binary Vision, a free guide that features essays, conversations, practical advice, and historical reflections. Part celebration and part practical resource, you can download it to find inspiration, new perspectives, and insights from a decade of prize recipients and jurors.

2. Learn And Be Self-Critical

Presenting your work is a great opportunity to see where you are at. Is your project at an early stage? Consider whether you might want to keep working on it and possibly apply next year. Have you been engaged with it for some time now? It might be a good moment to create a first edit, get feedback, and try to secure some funds to bring it ahead. Is it ready to circulate and have a life of its own? Then focus on refining your edit, sequence, and text, and go for it. Applying means you'll be following the grant from the beginning to the end, reviewing the shortlisted and awarded projects, and reading the judges motivations. It's a good occasion to motivate yourself, gain inspiration, and learn from other applicants' projects. A moment to be self-critical, learn, and improve as a practitioner.

3. Invest In Your Vision

This grant is not only meant to support you through exhibitions, press, and educational opportunities. It offers solid cash prizes that you can invest in the way you consider more proper. Over the years, we have seen prize recipients completing a project or starting a new one thanks to the funding they secured. Others were able to publish their work in a photobook or invest in education and equipment. The €10,000 cash split among the four main prizes represents a base to bring ahead your independent practice.

4. Upgrade Your Equipment

Translating a strong visual idea into a fully realized project often requires the right technical setup, but getting hold of specialized equipment can be tough. That is why MPB, Europe's top camera reseller, has partnered with us for this edition to offer two Special Mentions. Together with PhMuseum, they will select two projects, each receiving a €2,500 voucher redeemable on mpb.com. This gives you the freedom to choose exactly what your practice needs – from essential camera upgrades and extra lenses to field gear – helping you expand your creative capabilities while supporting a more sustainable, circular approach to photography equipment.

5. Exhibit Your Work In Italy

Our team will select another project to be exhibited at PhMuseum Lab, in Bologna, Italy. After Maria Lax's Some Kind of Heavenly Fire (June 2021), Sayuri Ichida's Fumiko (May 2022), Sara Bastai's RAM_4.0 (May 2023), Rita Puig Serra's Anatomy Of An Oyster (May 2024), Lucija Rosc's Six Stations and a Golden Tooth (June 2025), and Cintia Tortosa Santisteban's Screenshots From A Series Of Videos About A Rice Field (June 2026), we are keen to discover a new artist to work with. We will cover the show production and travel expenses. It is an opportunity to discover our space, meet the team, and most importantly connect with our audience in first person.

6. Gain Recognition

Over the past 13 years of activity we have studied the many photography grants and awards out there, aiming at understanding how this kind of opportunity can be the most beneficial for photographers. Year after year, we have improved our offering as well as the network of people who follow our platform. Thanks to the reputation we have been building, not only can you trust our grants program but also know that it will bring further recognition to your work, as its results are followed by many photographers, curators, editors, and publishers working in the field.

7. Open Doors To New Connections

This year's independent jury comprises professionals such as editor, curator and writer Elisa Medde, photographer Mariela Sancari, artist and photojournalist Yagazie Emezi, and photographer Myriam Boulos. They will review your submissions, spending time with them: applying is a way to get them to know your work and possibly create new connections.

Beyond the main prizes, Alessia Glaviano (Head of Global PhotoVogue and Director of the PhotoVogue Festival) will personally select one submission for an exclusive online featured interview on Vogue Italia.

Additionally, nine photographers chosen by the PhMuseum team will receive a free 30-minute portfolio review with a mentor of their choice from the PhMuseum Education Program – providing a great pathway to grow your network, gain valuable insight, and address specific questions about your career or project.

8. See Your Work In Print

Printed publications offer a permanent, physical home for visual storytelling. This year, the grant offers multiple opportunities to see your work published in collectible print formats. As a result of a recent collaboration, Ysaora Thibus, Olympic Medalist and Founder of Nineteen Hundred Magazine, will select one project connected to women’s sport for a printed feature in the magazine’s upcoming third issue, scheduled for release in March 2027.

Additionally, our team will handpick two or more projects for an extensive 8–12-page feature in the PhMuseum Annual third issue, launching in autumn 2027. It’s a way for us to give your work tangible visibility in a designed object that will travel and reach a new audience of industry professionals and photography lovers. This represents yet another opportunity to have your project spotlighted and preserved in a collectible format for years to come.

9. Spotlight Your Project

Grants are a channel for us to discover many new bodies of work, which we then hardly forget. We feature them on PhMuseum, we write about them, and make them circulate through our social media accounts and newsletter. The editorial line is one of the main activities nurturing PhMuseum, as it is followed by photographers, curators, and editors alike, with 800,000 annual visitors and around 190,000 people following us on social media. We wish to select works with clever, new visual strategies, a curatorial aim also pursued through our photography festival PhMuseum Days. Every year, our independent research nurtures the festival's exhibition program, with open calls being a core component of this process.

10. Support PhMuseum

We are an independent organisation that has been growing organically year after year, mostly thanks to the photographers who have trusted our grants and education programs. We reinvest around 70% of the entry fees in developing our platform and growing our team. When you apply, you participate in the improvement of our free services, whilst granting us the opportunity to self-finance ourselves without turning to sponsors or investors. This is very important in order to preserve the integrity and independence of our voice and to keep enjoying activities such as the Festivals, Awards, News and Stories sections, as well as exhibitions at PhMuseum Lab and PhMuseum Days, our International Photography Festival in Bologna.

11. You Have To Try

It's only with hard work and a continue effort that you can grow as a professional. Getting your work recognised by an important panel of judges is a great motivation to keep developing your practice. We know how much hard work there is behind your projects, and how many talented photographers there are today. Even if sometimes you feel you have tried enough or that you are not ready yet, we recommend you to not give up, accepting that failure is part of the career of all of us and a great motivation to keep improving and obtain success in the future. As the hockey Hall of Famer Wayne Gretzky once said, you miss 100 percent of the shots you don't take.

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The PhMuseum 2026 Women Photographers Grant is currently open for submissions. Its aim is to empower the work and careers of female and non-binary professionals of all ages and from all countries working in diverse areas of photography. To learn more and apply, visit phmuseum.com/w26. Final Deadline: 15 October