Professional Shortlist & Finalists: first look

Earlier today, the shortlist and the finalists of the Professional competition in the Sony World Photography Awards 2024 were revealed. The competition recognises the best photography series worldwide, rewarding masterful techniques and original approaches to storytelling. 

This year we hit the highest number of entries to the Professional competition on record. This is reflected in the expansive range of topics and subjects represented in over 90 projects. From Bavarian finger wrestling to the Gay Space Agency to the remnants of a nuclear testing site in Kazakhstan, the celebrated photography projects reveal captivating stories from all corners of the globe, providing you with incredible insight into the world around us. 

We share some of our highlights below.

The Creative category celebrates the creative use of the medium of photography in all its forms - from photograms to cutting-edge photographic techniques. 

Tine Poppe’s series Gilded Lilies: Portraits of Cut Flowers considers the damaging environmental impact of cut flowers through carefully crafted images of bouquets against backdrops of landscapes devastated by climate change. Placing real plants against the backdrops imbues the photographs with an ethereal quality, evoking an uncanny sensation that transports viewers to another realm. The Long Road of Sand by Romain Laurendeau transports you to the French coastline and ‘experiments with the random, organic alteration of digital images printed on long-out-of-date photographic paper from the 1970s, combined with lith developer’. Daniela Balestrin’s series of polyptychs ‘Where Does the Tree End and the Rest of the World Begin?’ reveals the extraordinary in the trivial, revealing an everyday kind of magic

The Wildlife & Nature category rewards series that offer an insight into the natural world, highlighting both the beauty of Earth’s fauna and flora as well as the delicate balance of its ecosystem. The need to protect the planet’s natural environment comes through clearly in the celebrated series.

Jasper Doest’s In the Footsteps of Giants, pictured above, looks into the fragile equilibrium between elephants and humans in rural parts of Zambia, emphasising the importance of their harmonious coexistence. In Hazy Canadian Skies, Jen Osborne documents the effects of the Canadian wildfires, presenting a landscape reminiscent of pop culture portrayals of the post-apocalyptic world. Eva Berler’s Suspended Worlds is a fascinating study that takes a closer look at the intricate designs of spiderwebs.

The Architecture & Design category explores human habitats, recognising the different ways in which architecture and design both shape and mirror our society’s needs and wants. Fading Prairie by Marc Koegel beautifully captures the vanishing man-made structures of the Canadian Prairies, emphasising their quiet solitude. Sala Mayor (Living Room) by Siobhan Doran chronicles the living rooms of opulent ancestral homes in the Philippines. Karol Palka’s Spa Island dives into the structures built around the natural healing waters of Slovakia, which have served as pivotal spaces for communities for centuries.

The Portraiture category takes a closer look at the faces that make up our world. Adali Schell’s The First Car, pictured above, invokes nostalgia by documenting LA teenagers with a quintessential symbol of the American coming-of-age: their very first car.  In Descendants of Black American Civil War Combatants, Drew Gardner recreates photographs of black American Civil War soldiers by tracing their descendants, using a period 5x7-inch tintype process in an authentic daylight studio. In Donghai Island People Liang Chen returns to their childhood hometown - the East Island village - in the hopes of freezing time before industrialisation changes the island forever.

The 10 category winners, chosen from the finalist series, will be announced on 18 April at a black-tie ceremony in London. The category winners are then in the running for the Photographer of the Year title, a coveted prize awarding the recipient $25,000, a range of impressive camera kit plus a solo show at the following year’s Sony World Photography Awards exhibition in London.

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© Kathleen Orlinsky, United States, Shortlist, Professional competition, Wildlife & Nature, Sony World Photography Awards 2024
© Davide Monteleone, Italy, Finalist, Professional competition, Documentary Projects, Sony World Photography Awards 2024
© Adali Schell, United States, Finalist, Professional competition, Portraiture, Sony World Photography Awards 2024
© Jen Osborne, Canada, Shortlist, Professional competition, Wildlife & Nature, Sony World Photography Awards 2024
© Frankie Mills, United Kingdom, Shortlist, Professional competition, Documentary Projects, Sony World Photography Awards 2024
© Liang Chen, China Mainland, Shortlist, Professional competition, Portraiture, Sony World Photography Awards 2024
© Jim Fenwick, United Kingdom, Finalist, Professional competition, Landscape, Sony World Photography Awards 2024
© Owen Harvey, United Kingdom, Shortlist, Professional competition, Portraiture, Sony World Photography Awards 2024
© Steven Begleiter, United States, Shortlist, Professional competition, Wildlife & Nature, Sony World Photography Awards 2024
© Mojtaba Radmanesh, Iran, Islamic Republic Of, Shortlist, Professional competition, Portfolio, Sony World Photography Awards 2024
© Eddo Hartmann, Netherlands, Finalist, Professional competition, Landscape, Sony World Photography Awards 2024
© Jens Juul, Denmark, Shortlist, Professional competition, Documentary Projects, Sony World Photography Awards 2024
© Brent Stirton, South Africa, Finalist, Professional competition, Documentary Projects, Sony World Photography Awards 2024
© Lukas Zeman, Czech Republic, Shortlist, Professional competition, Wildlife & Nature, Sony World Photography Awards 2024
© Jonas Kakó, Germany, Shortlist, Professional competition, Environment, Sony World Photography Awards 2024