@ Brais Lorenzo, 2ndo Premio Vida Cotidiana (individual)

LALO ALMEIDA IS THE IBERO-AMERICAN PHOTOGRAPHER OF THE YEAR AT POY LATAM 2021

  • This year POY Latam celebrates its tenth anniversary recognizing excellence in documentary, journalistic and artistic photography in Latin America.
  • The POY Latam jury had to evaluate 22,288 images from 1,084 photographers who applied in 14 categories.    
  • Forty-two percent of the photographers were women, demonstrating the power of the female gaze in Latin America. The jury was composed of five women and one man.
  • The judging rounds in photography, which took place in virtual format from January 14th to 16th, were transmitted live through POYLatam’s social networks and awarded 60 works by photographers from 16 countries.
  • For the first time and due to the health emergency, POYLatam added four special health categories sponsored by the company Janssen, from the Johnson & Johnson group: The Pandemic in Ibero-America, Patients, Caregivers and Mental Health.
  • Due to the large number of applications, in the film and multimedia category (approximately 900) the juries continue to review and select the finalists. The announcement of the winners will be made at an event, which will be broadcast on POYLatam’s social networks, next Saturday, January 30th at 6pm (Hora Quito-Ecuador).
  • Registration is still open, until January 31st, for the amateur photography contest on Instagram, which awards $ 1,000.00 to the first place. The judging will take place on February 6th through POYLatam’s social networks.
  • The sponsors of this edition were Janssen, from the Johnson & Johnson group, POY International, the U of Miami School of Communication, Edoc, Fotógrafas Latam, Ambulante, SolipsisArt and the Inter-American Press Society.

Quito, January 16, 2021. The Brazilian, Lalo Almeida, was selected as the Ibero-American Photographer of the Year at POY Latam 2021, which in its sixth edition broadcasted live the judging and selection of finalists through the competition’s social networks.

The jury of the contest was composed of the Mexican Gael Almeida, the Argentine Gisela Volá, the Ecuadorian Karla Gachet, the French-Cuban Magdalena Herrera, the Portuguese Daniel Rodríguez and the American Mallory Benedict. The judges connected, through the virtual format, from seven countries for the deliberation and selection of the winners.

The special health categories, sponsored by Janssen, from the Johnson and Johnson group, which aim to highlight the importance of health in these times of pandemic, had as winners Raphael Alves (Pandemic in Latin America), José Colón (Patients), Nuria López Torres (Caregivers) and the Ecuadorian Johis Alarcón (Mental Health). The winners in each category will receive a $1,000 prize.

The second and third place, in the category Ibero-American Photographer of the Year, went to the German-Argentinean Sarah Pabst and the Mexican Luis Antonio Rojas. The photo-documentalist Sarah Pabst was also recognized with second place (Individual News) and an honorable mention in the category Nuestra Mirada.   

In the category of Daily Life (Individual) the winner was the Colombian-Venezuelan Miguel Gutiérrez, with an image that portrays the crisis of basic services in Venezuela by capturing children taking a bath in a sewer. Brais Lorenzo Couto (Spain) and Constanza Portnoy (Argentina), won second and third place. The Spanish Ester Pérez Berenguer won first place in Vida Cotidiana (Series), with the photo story “Rompiendo el silencio”, an exhibition about the struggle of Mayan women in Guatemala for their territory and body.

Among the winners in other categories are: Chilean Javier Vergara (Noticias-Individual), with an image about the social explosion of November 11, 2019, under the title “Chile resists” and Mexican César Rodríguez (Noticias-Series), with the photographic story about the murder of several U.S. citizens in Hermosillo, Sonora-Mexico.     

Brazilian Mauricio Lima (Individual Portrait) and Chilean Cristobal Olivares (Portrait Series). In the Sports category, the jury decided to give first place to the photographs of Santiago Barreiro (Uruguay) and Guillermo Arias (Mexico).

The Carolina Hidalgo Vivar Environmental Award went to Brazilian photographer Felipe Fittipaldi, with a series on the devastation caused by the 2019 fires in the Amazon, the largest rainforest in the world and home to more than half of the world’s land-based animal species. Ecuadorian Isadora Romero and Argentine Pablo Ernesto Piovano won second and third place in this category that recognizes documentary and journalistic excellence in portraying nature and understanding the damage that humans are causing to the environment and the enormous challenges of climate change.

He also highlighted the work of French-Spanish photographer Séverine Sajous in the category Nuestra Mirada, a series of 10 images that allow us to reflect on the times we have lived through. The Mexican Koral Carballo (Second Place) and the Peruvian Victor Zea (Third Place) were also finalists in this category.

The mission of Pictures of the Year Latam (POY Latam), which this year celebrates its tenth anniversary, is to recognize excellence in documentary photography and photojournalism in Latin America. For Pablo Corral Vega, it is a visual reflection on the human rights situation and the issues that compromise and affect us: “The contest is an open window to the realities and news that have marked us in the last two years. For this reason, this sixth edition contemplated Janssen’s special categories on health as a look at the impact of the pandemic on our lives”.

Regarding the film and multimedia entries, the POYLatam directors pointed out that due to the large number of works, approximately 900, the jury was formed by the founder and creative director of Skylight, the American Pamela Yates, the Ecuadorian filmmaker and journalist Manolo Sarmiento, the programming director of Ambulante Documentary Tour; Meghan Monsour, the Cuban-Venezuelan filmmaker, audiovisual journalist and educator Irene Carolina Herrera, and the American journalists Deborah Acosta and Robert Hernández, decided to continue the review and proclaim the winners in an event that will be broadcast through the contest’s social networks next Saturday, January 30, starting at 6 pm (Hora Quito-Ecuador).

In addition, it was reported that the amateur photography contest on Instagram, which awards $ 1,000.00 to the first place, will close registration on January 31 and the judging will be on February 6 through the social networks of POYLatam. The jury is made up of the photographers. Karla Gachet (Ecuador), Gisela Volá (Argentina), Peruvian photographer and filmmaker Oscar Durand (USA) and Ecuadorian photojournalist, writer, artist and cultural manager Pablo Corral Vega.

POYLatam 2021 was sponsored by Janssen Latam of the Johnson & Johnson group, Festival EDOC – Encuentros del Otro Cine, Instituto de Prensa-SIP, University of Miami, Fotógrafas Latinoamericanas, and the communication support of SolipsisArt photography collective Ecuador.  

POY Latam was created by American Loup Langton and Ecuadorian Pablo Corral Vega in 2011, with the objective of celebrating excellence in documentary, journalistic and artistic photography in Latin America. This is the first time that the judging, selection and awards are done virtually.

The POY Latam jury evaluated 22,288 images from 1,084 photographers who applied in 14 categories. 

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