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Winners of the Sony World Photography Awards 2020 announced

World Photography Organisation's picture
by World Photography Organisation
4 years ago

It's an exciting day at the World Photography Organisation as today we've revealed the overall winners for this year's Sony World Photography Awards. Created by the World Photography Organisation and sponsored by Sony, the Awards has four competitions: Professional, Open, Youth and Student. It is one of the world’s largest and prestigious photography competitions, with more than 345,000 images from 203 countries and territories submitted across the four competitions for the 2020 edition. More than 135,000 images were entered into the Professional competition this year – the highest entries to date.

Join us in applauding the leading photographers today and their talent, dedication and creativity. Below you will enjoy winners from all four competitions, plus the Alpha Female Award and Latin America Professional Award winners - both new awards for 2020. You will also find a link to the Professional competition category winners to watch their acceptance videos.

 

 PHOTOGRAPHER OF THE YEAR and LATIN AMERICA PROFESSIONAL AWARD WINNER

Pablo Albarenga, Uruguay

© Pablo Albarenga, Uruguay, Photographer of the Year, Sony World Photography Awards 2020
Seeds of Resistance is a body of work that pairs photographs of landscapes and territories in danger from mining and agribusinesses with portraits of the activists fighting to conserve them. Pablo explores the bond between the defenders and their lands – a sacred area in which hundreds of generations of their ancestors rest. In the photographs, the main characters in the stories are seen from above, as though they are laying down their lives for their territory. Pablo wins $25,000 and is the inaugual winner of the Latin America Professional Award. See his full series here. Enjoy Pablo's full portfolio on his website, here. 

 

PROFESSIONAL COMPETITION CATEGORY WINNERS 

The Professional competition represents the importance of the series and breaking new ground in the photographic medium. Asking artists to submit a body of work interpreting one of the ten thematic categories, each entry is rigorously judged in its narrative excellence, technical skill and ability in exploring creativity in new and exciting ways. Enjoy our ten category winners' acceptance videos here.

 

OPEN PHOTOGRAPHER OF THE YEAR

Tom Oldham, United Kingdom

© Tom Oldham, United Kingdom, Open Photographer of the Year, Sony World Photography Awards 2020
Black Francis is a black & white portrait of Pixies frontman Charles Thompson (aka Black Francis), originally taken for MOJO Magazine. Asked by Tom to acknowledge his frustration with photoshoots, Francis offered a perfect gesture of exasperation by digging his hands into his face. The result was an expressive photograph which ran as the lead image for the article. Tom wins $5,000. Enjoy Tom's full portfolio on his website here. 

 

STUDENT PHOTOGRAPHER OF THE YEAR

Ioanna Sakellaraki, Greece

© Ioanna Sakellaraki, Royal College of Art, Student Photographer of the Year, 2020 Sony World Photography Awards
Aeiforia presents night-time photographs of solar panels, wind turbines and battery farms used across the small island of Tilos in Greece which is the first in the Mediterranean to run almost entirely on renewable energy. Ioanna wins €30,000 of Sony digital imaging kit for her institution. See Ioanna's full series here. Enjoy Ioanna's full portfolio on her website here.

 

ALPHA FEMALE AWARD WINNER 

Lily Dawson-Punshon

© Lily Dawson-Punshon, United Kingdom, Alpha Female Award winner, Sony World Photography Awards 2020

Lily's portrait references historical paintings, particularly Johannes Vermeer's Girl with the Pearl Earring, but she has brought in an 21st-century twist. Lily explains how her photograph aims to explore the relationship between the past and the present, and how both contrast and support each other.

 

YOUTH PHOTOGRAPHER OF THE YEAR 

Hsien-Pang Hsieh, Taiwan, 19 years old

© Hsien-Pang Hsieh, Taiwan, Youth Photographer of the Year,Sony World Photography Awards 2020
Hurry, features a street performer who is seemingly walking in a hurry but is in fact standing still. Inspired by his experience as a newly arrived student in Germany, Hsien-Pang sees the image as his comment on the intensive pace of life and a reminder others to slow down. Enjoy Roger's Instagram feed here. 
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