2013 Sony World Photography Awards Professional and Open shortlists announced

The World Photography Organisation today reveals the shortlists for the Professional, Open and Youth categories of the 2013 Sony World Photography Awards.

In a year that saw over 122,000 entries from 170 countries – the highest number of submissions to date - the judges have selected a shortlist of photographs that stood out beyond all others for their impressive high quality, originality and modern appeal. Topics ranged from haunting shots of the Syrian conflict to the Obama presidential campaign; an intimate study of cinema-goers in Kabul to quirky and witty shots of the animal kingdom.

Bringing together the very best international contemporary photography, the shortlist offers a unique insight into 2012 through the eyes of some of the world’s best emerging and established photography talents. Photographers returning to the awards include: Javier Arcenillas (Spain); Robin Hammond (New Zealand) and Paolo Pellegrin (Italy). Exciting up-and-coming photographers new to the awards include Ed Kashi (USA) and Andrea Gjestvang (Norway).

The Honorary Jury, which selected the Professional shortlist, was chaired by Catherine Chermayeff, Director of Special Projects at Magnum Photos. She comments: “What an invigorating three days - which resulted in lively and passionate debates. I think we, the jurors, all began this process and felt overwhelmed. I am delighted to say that by day three, each group proudly presented and argued for our respective shortlists and found surprising strength in the shortlist submissions across all categories.”

Astrid Merget, Creative Director of the World Photography Organisation, adds: “The World Photography Organisation is dedicated to finding the best international contemporary photography from across the world. The shortlist is a clear indication of the exciting photography which is out there and, as we do every year, we are looking forward to presenting this collection of photographers to a global audience.”

The work of all the shortlisted photographers will be exhibited at Somerset House, London, from 26 April – 12 May as part of the 2013 Sony World Photography Awards Exhibition. The images will also be published in the 2013 edition of the Sony World Photography Awards book.

The Open and Youth category winners will be announced on 19 March.

Professional category winners and the coveted L’Iris D’Or/ Sony World Photography Awards Photographer of the Year title will be announced at a gala ceremony in London on 25 April. The L’Iris D’Or winner will receive $25,000 (USD) and the Open Photographer of the Year will receive $5,000 (USD). All winners, including category winners, will receive the latest digital imaging equipment from Sony.

For further information and for access to the WPO press centre please contact:

Jill Cotton at World Photography Organisation

+44 (0) 20 7886 3146/ + 44 (0)7557 261 537 / jill@worldphoto.org

SHORTLIST

Professional Competition

Honorary Jury

Presiding Chair: Catherine Chermayoff (USA), Director of Special Projects at Magnum Photos

Chairs: Edmund Clark (UK) Photographer; Tim Paton (UK), Managing Director, Balcony Jump; Francesca Sears (UK), Director, Panos Profile at Panos Pictures and Monica Suder (Germany) Photographic Consultant and Coach

Additional Jury: Juana de Aizpuru (Spain), Gallery Director, Galeria Juana de Aizpuru; Chien-Chi Chang (Taiwan) Magnum Photographer; Brandei Estes (France), Assistant Director, Galerie Nelson Freeman; Macduff Everton (USA), Photographer; Caroline Metcalfe (UK), Director of Photography, Conde Nast Traveller: Andrew Sanigar (UK), Commissioning Editor, Thames & Hudson and Fiona Shields (UK), Picture Editor, The Guardian.

The Honorary Jury were required to choose a minimum of three and a maximum of 10 photographers per category. Photographers entered a minimum of three and maximum of 10 images per category and were judged on a body of work. All images must have been taken in 2012 or first published in 2012. One winner per category will be chosen from the finalists and announced on 25 April 2013.

*Photographers are listed alphabetically

Architecture

Finalist

• Fabrice Fouillet, France
• Reinis Hofmanis, Latvia
• Christof Pluemacher, Germany

Shortlist

• Dilip Bhatia, India
• Yannic Bartolozzi, Switzerland
• André Ferreira, Brazil
• Julia Anna Gospodarou/ Moment Agency, Greece

Arts & Culture

Finalist

• Myriam Meloni, Italy
• Niccolo Rastrelli, Italy
• Danish Siddiqui/Reuters, India

Shortlisted

• Yannick Cormier, France
• Fausto Podavini, Italy
• Daniele Tamagni, Italy

Campaign

Finalist

• Christian Aslund, Sweden
• Spencer Murphy, UK
• Scout Tufankjian, USA

Shortlisted

• Satirat Damampai, Thailand
• Tomoe Hayakawa, Japan
• Brooks Kraft/Corbis, USA
• Andreas Meichsner, Germany
• Tine Poppe, Norway
• F. Scott Schafer, USA
• Michael Schnabel, Germany

Conceptual

Finalist

• Edurne Aguinaga, Spain
• Florian Ruiz, France
• Roman Pyatkovka, Ukraine

Shortlisted

• Julia Borissova, Russia
• Maia Flore, France
• Gail Albert Halana, USA
• Jenny Magruder, USA
• Sergey Varaksin, Russia

Current Affairs

Finalist

• Fabio Bucciarelli, Italy
• Paolo Pellegrin, Italy
• Ilya Pitalev/RIA Novosti, Russia

Shortlisted

• Colin Delfosse, Belgium
• Ed Kashi, USA
• Andrew Lubimov, Ukraine
• Angelos Tzortzinis, Greece
• Oliver Weiken, Germany
• Alexander Junior Zemlianichenko, Russia

Contemporary Issues

Finalist

• Valerio Bispuri/Echo Press, Italy
• Samuel James, USA
• Daesung Lee/SIPA Press, Republic of Korea

Shortlisted

• Javier Arcenillas, Spain
• Adam Dean/ Panos for New York Times & Int. Herald Tribune, UK
• Robin Hammond/Panos, New Zealand
• Justin Jin/Panos, Hong Kong/China
• Peter Muller, USA

Fashion & Beauty

Finalist

• Thierry Bouët, France
• Alice Pavesi, Italy
• Klaus Thymann/Adamsky, Denmark

Shortlisted

• Rory Carnegie, UK
• Rafal Milach, Poland
• Filippo Mutani, Italy
• Meeghan Ogilvie, Canada
• Dominik Tarabanski, Poland

Landscape

Finalist

• Regis Boileau, France
• Arjen Schmitz, Netherlands
• Nenad Saljic, Croatia

Shortlisted

• Sandra Herd, Australia
• Li Fan, China
• Bernhard Winkler, Germany
• Kechun Zhang/MoST Artists, China

Lifestyle

Finalist

• Alice Caputo, Italy
• Fausto Podavini, Italy
• Kuni Takahashi, Japan

Shortlisted

• Aleksey Myakishev, Russia
• Mohammad Rakibul Hasan, Bangladesh

Nature & Wildlife

Finalist

• Hudson Garcia, Brazil
• Ernest Goh, Singapore
• Satoru Kondo, Japan

Shortlisted

• Regis Boileau, France
• Walter Fogel, Germany
• Mehmet Karaca, Turkey
• Jose Ramon Moreno, Spain

People

Finalist

• Balazs Gardi, Hungary
• Andrea Gjestvang, Norway
• Pete Muller, US

Shortlisted

• Adam Dean/ Panos for New York Times & Int. Herald Tribune, UK
• Ivan Kashinsky/Panos, United States Minor Outlying Islands
• Jacek Świerczyński, Poland
• Michela Taeggi, Italy
• Paul Wenham-Clarke, UK
• Lisa Whiltse, US

Portraiture

Shortlisted

• Marcco Ceccaroni, Italy
• Maxim Dondyuk, Ukraine
• Li Fan, China
• Jens Juul, Denmark
• Davide Monteleone, Italy
• Agnieszka Rayss, Poland

Sport

Finalist

• Isabela Pacini, Brazil
• Ryan Pierse/Getty Images, Australia
• Adam Pretty/Getty Images, Australia

Shortlisted

• Fernando Borges, Brazil
• Michael Löwa, Germany
• Yusuke Murata, Japan
• Alma Photos, Italy
• Vilhelm Stokstad, Sweden
• Rob van Thienen, Belgium
• Robin Utrecht, Netherlands

Still Life

Shortlisted

• Rastislav Čambal, Czech Republic
• Vanessa Colareta, Peru
• Nick Todak, USA

Travel

Finalist

• Daniel Duart, Spain
• Johannes Heuckeroth, Germany
• Gali Tibbon, Israel

Shortlisted

• Matteo Butturini, Italy
• Agurtxane Concellon, Norway
• Scott Stulburg/Corbis, USA
• Val Proudkii, USA

Open competition

Judging committee:

Presiding Chair: Damien Demolder (UK), Editor of Amateur Photographer magazine

Additional Jury: Astrid Merget, Creative Director, World Photography Organisation

Judges could select up to 10 shortlisted images per category and photographers were judged on a single snapshot in any category. All photographs must have been taken in 2012. One winner will be chosen per category and announced on 19 March 2013. The overall Open winner will be announced 25 April.

Architecture

• Martina Biccheri, Italy
• Flavio D'Aquino, Italy
• István Forgács, Hungary
• Ralph Gräf, Germany
• Paweł Karasiński, Poland
• Igor Krieg, Germany
• Peter Mysticdidge Plorin, Germany
• Jens Oliver Klaffs, Germany
• Max van Son, Netherlands
• Алексей Скрипин, Russia

Arts and Culture

• Mohdfaridzazhar Azhar, Malaysia
• Dibyendu Dey Choudhury, India
• Arup Ghosh, India
• Jessica Hetke, Germany
• Hg Chai Hock, Singapore
• Fahmy Husain, Indonesia
• Anurag Kumar, India
• Chen Long Wen, Malaysia
• Mohammad reza Masoumi, Iran
• Gilbert Yu, Hong Kong/China

Enhanced

• Gerhard Burger, Germany
• Danny Cohen, Australia
• Michal Giedrojc, Poland
• Samad Ghorbanzadeh, Iran
• Michel Lagarde, France
• Hoang Hiep Nguyen, Vietnam
• Nina Piatrouskaya, Belarus
• Christine Simpson, Ireland
• Victoria Panasenko, Ukraine
• Chanhoe Kim, Korea

Low Light

• Elmar Akhmetov, Kazakhstan
• Tatjana Bachmistova, Lithuania
• Harry Fisch, Spain
• Yi-Hsien Lee, Taiwan
• Torsten Muehlbacher, Austria
• Manish Patel, UK
• Chris Round, Australia
• Cemil Seyis, Turkey
• Tino Solomon, UK

Nature & Wildlife

• Marek Andrzejewski, Poland
• Roberto Bettacchi, Italy
• Peter Delaney, South Africa
• Frederick van Heerden, South Africa
• Krasimir Matarov, Bulgaria
• John Matzick, USA
• Hoang Hiep Nguyen, Vietnam
• Petar Sabol, Croatia
• Ricardo Venerando, Brazil
• Christian Vizl, Mexico

Panoramic

• Luca Benini, Italy
• Florian Breuer, South Africa
• Jason Hipp, USA
• Konrad Lenz, Germany
• Fabricio Pretti, UK
• Anatoly Rudakov, Germany
• Michael Schulze, Germany
• Christian Stangl, Austria
• Pawel Uchorczak, Poland
• Yeow Kwang Yeo, Singapore

People

• Ahmad Al Rikaby, UK
• Ali Asadi, Iran
• Miguel Candela, Spain
• Karolina Grabowska, Poland
• Paolo Mezzera, Italy
• Reza Nezamdust, Iran
• Louise Porter, USA
• Roman Shalenkin, Russia
• Natalia Wiernik, Poland
• Tadahiko Hisatomi, Japan

Smile

• Abhijit Dey, India
• Eleri Griffiths, UK
• Madhabendu Hensh, India,
• Huu Hung Truong, Vietnam
• Mac Kwan, China
• Dinh Manh Tai, Vietnam
• Paulo Mittelman, Brazil
• Sandipan Mukherjee, India
• Nick Riley, UK
• Boguslawa Trela, Poland

Split Second

• Ata Mohammad Adnan, Bangladesh
• Gregory Bogaert, Belgium
• Massimo Ferrero, Italy
• Matías Gálvez, Chile
• Nicola Genchi, Italy
• Tamás Nagy, Hungary
• Fabian Oefner, Switzerland
• Barbara Roppo, Italy
• Markus Reugels, Germany
• Kazi Riasat Alve, Bangladesh

Travel

• Peyman Bordbar, Iran
• Andrey Ermolaev Russia x 2
• Manny Fajutag, Philippines
• Maciej Grzegorzek, Poland
• Maciej Makowski, Poland
• Hajdu Tamas, Romania
• Nathan Wills, Australia
• Елена Мозговая, Ukraine
• Artem Zhushman, Russia

Youth competition

Open to photographers aged under 20 year old and judged by the World Photography Organisation.

Culture

• Biswajit Biswas, Bangladesh
• Ilia Filin, Hungary
• Abdelrhman Hussein, Egypt
• Yusuf Kadermia, USA
• Julia Merrick, Australia
• Toby Pickard, UK

Environment

• Anders Austrheim, Norway
• Henrik Follesø Egeland, Norway
• Robert Gifford, UK
• Galina Kapitonova, Russia
• Jimmy, Taiwan
• Lior Kestenberg, Israel
• Ramin Krause, Germany
• Joe Stockdale, UK
• Marin Sušlić, Croatia
• Michael Wilkie, Australia

Portraiture

• Marina Abdullaeva, Russia
• Samantha Bermúdez, Argentina
• Alecsandra Dragoi, Romania
• Alyona Korolyova, Russia
• Jonathan Liu, Singapore
• Julia Merrick, Australia
• Diko Risanto, Indonesia
• Berta Vicente, Spain