Tara Laure Claire Receive The 1st Prize Of The PhMuseum 2023 Photography Grant

The Franco-Indian photographer explores the facets of life in her project The Studio. Peruvian Joseph Ladron de Guevara the New Generation Prize. Discover all the judges motivations and awarded projects of this 11th edition!

For the 11th edition of our annual grant dedicated to photography and visual language, an independent jury comprised of Jason Fulford (Photographer and co-founder of J&L Books), Federica Chiocchetti (Director of the Musée des Beaux-Arts Le Locle - MBAL), Vasantha Yogananthan (Photographer and co-founder of Chose Commune), and Max Siedentopf (Multi-disciplinary conceptual artist) has assigned the €5,000 PhMuseum 2023 Photography Grant Main Prize to Franco-Indian photographer Tara Laure Claire for her project The Studio.

Judge Vasantha Yogananthan explains the choice on behalf of the panel: “The protagonists from The Studio feel like family. They have fun. They dress up. They are sad. They wonder about the mysteries of existence. They look inwards and outwards in a series of performative pictures that bring back one’s own memories — after all, who has never played for the camera? Tara Laure Claire's work reminds us that photography can be a democratic tool to let our creativity shine and to reflect on our lives.”

The € 2,000-second prize was claimed by Hungarian photographer Andras Ladocsi who presented the project There Is A Big River, In Which There Is A Big Island, In Which There Is A Lake, In Which There Is An Island, In Which There Is A Small House, Where A Life Is Growing In A Womb. The choice is explained by Judge Jason Fulford: “When we look at Andras Ladocsi's work, and live vicariously through his camera, we experience the life-affirming pleasure of friendship.”

The third prize of €1,000 was awarded instead to Franco-Armenian artist Camille Lévêque for her work Tsavt Tanem. Judge Federica Chiocchetti motivates the panel's decision: “With her multilayered compelling narrative, Camille Lévêque teleports us into a fascinating universe of diaspora, memory, and rituals. The French-born artist explores her Armenian heritage, the burden of an unrecognized genocide, the construction of memory, and the narratives that pass from generation to generation thanks to an articulated usage of the visual language. Portraits, landscapes, drawings, archival images, and documents intertwine into a speculative narrative that successfully questions the theme of identity and representation.”

The New Generation Prize offering €2,000 was assigned to Peruvian photographer Joseph Ladron de Guevara who presented the project Si El Sol Llegara A Oscurecer. The jury explains: “When does faith blind us? Peruvian photographer Joseph Ladron de Guevara delves into spirituality starting from the personal story of his grandmother. His visual strategy pairs family archives and notes from her diaries, documentation of Christian believers' communities and contemplative images of nature. The result is an open and evocative narrative that engages us with the theme of loss and acceptance in an impressively mature way for an artist of his age.”

PhEST's team granted a solo show at the coming edition of the Italian festival to Eviction by Ingmar Björn Nolting. Giovanni Troilo (PhEST Artistic Director) and Arianna Rinaldo (PhEST Photography Curator) explain how they selected the work that will be exhibited in Monopoli, Italy this summer: "Eviction is a tale of resistance and of loss. It stands for what we all need to fight for, the future of our planet, and the forces we encounter against us. Nolting’s story on the activists in the small German village is subtle but harsh. The images and their soft tones take us into a parallel dimension where idealism and climate activism are protagonists. Even if this fight is lost, the poetry and strength of each individual portrayed while trying to make a difference in the world, becomes a universal cry for what needs to be done: save our planet with our actions, one by one."

German Artist Masha Wysocka will travel to Landskrona this fall to produce work informed by the Swedish town and surrounding areas thanks to the residency bursary offered by Landskrona Foto. Their Artistic Director Jenny Nordquist commented: "As springtime lay bare the ground, so does Wysocka’s work unearth stories archived long ago. Examining what is kept for posterity with a critical eye, as well as incorporating accounts from different sources makes a tale pieced together from different timelines and intentions. The notion of multiple truth, fiction and nonfiction storytelling is studied, becoming work that in a complex and poetic way discusses what stories we ultimately tell about ourselves. It is nothing less than scrutinizing truth itself, and how we put photography and text in the service of narrating history as we want it. "

H Is For Hemp by Maren Krings

The exhibition at Fonderia 20.9 was awarded instead to H Is For Hemp by Maren Krings. The gallery Directors commented "H is for Hemp is a global research on Industrial Hemp in the broader context of climate change challenges. A six-year-long project with the goal to examine how hemp can help create circular economies and contribute to a system reset. Maren Krings has documented more than 200 projects in 26 countries on four continents and interviewed more than 80 industry experts. Photo documentaries, expert interviews and infographics make  H is for Hemp an exhibition and a book printed on hemp paper, developed for this production in collaboration with the paper producer Hahnemühle. Among the meaningful topic and areas of investigation, what we find interesting in Maren’work is the will to experiment with how photography exhibitions can be made more sustainable. New materials, frameless hanging, ecologically produced inks, weight, packing and size optimization of the exhibition works will be part of the curatorial process."

The exhibition at Getxo Photo Festival was awarded instead to Protege Noctem by Italian Mattia Balsamini. The festival Artistic Director Maria Ptkq comments on the decision to bring the project to the Basque Country this June: GetxoPhoto on Mattia Balsamini In the 1990s, Europe and Russia tried to create a network of satellites that would reflect sunlight and illuminate the Earth permanently. Fortunately, this fantasy of total lighting did not prosper, but we have arrived at a similar situation with alarming consequences by other means, as completely dark nights have disappeared except in a few parts of the globe. Protege Noctem is a broad and incisive documentation project that chronicles the impact of overexposure to ALAN (Artificial Light At Night) together with experiments and citizen science projects that are fighting against the disappearance of the night.

A big thank you to all participants, jurors and organisations who supported this 11th edition. Many projects will be featured in the coming months. Meanwhile, enjoy all the results at phmuseum.com/g23!