The World Press Photo is back to Barcelona with the most awaited photojournalism exhibition of the year, showing situations without any type of censorship. A whole year in pictures in CCCB!
The 11th edition of the photography contest World Press Photo is back after one year in cultural centre Centro de Cultura Contemporánea de Barcelona (CCCB) from November 12th to December 13th. The exhibition, organized by foundation Photographic Social Vision, gathers 134 photographs and 7 multimedia projects, some of which will be awarded this prestigious international photojournalism prize.
The exhibition is completed by a whole range of parallel activities: talks, workshops and guided visits, apart from interviews to the authors and jurors.
This time, the World Press Photo 2015 has awarded 45 prizes to 41 authors from 17 different nationalities. This is the annual summary of art without going out from Raval Neighbourhood.
This year’s winning image is a photo by Dane Mads Nissen, portraying the homosexual couple Jon and Alex, sharing an intimate moment in their small apartment. This perfectly reflects the heading of the exhibition: ‘Seeing is Understanding’.
This is an exhibition that looks for making everybody aware of a lively, stunning and real world!
Lively, stunning and real journey
With more than a decade of history, the World Press Photo is back to Barcelona. Its organizers want to show documentary photography as an important tool to raise awareness, by “offering new and alternative points of view of the world”, in the words of Silvia Omedes (Director of Photographic Social Vision).
Apart from the news, the exhibition goes throughout some other worldwide issues, such as nature, health, sport and environment.
One of the photographs receiving the greatest number of visits is the winning image, a masterpiece by Mads Nissen that, regardless of its beautiful background, it goes beyond the traditional image of love.
It represents an homosexual couple in their apartment in Saint Petersburg. “The picture is like a mirror that reflects yourself” for you to discover the limits of tolerance, according to Nissen himself.
Each of the pictures looks for sympathy and tries to use culture, countries and groups of people as a point in common. The immortalization of a moment is achieved by the power of the camera.
From aerial pictures capturing the effect of mankind on nature to images of the daily life reflected by the shadows of students in an American backyard.
Some realities seem to be far away from us, whereas some others are strongly connected to Europe. This is the case of the picture by Massimo Sestini, reflecting a boat crowded with immigrants on Lampedusa’s coast.
This picture was taken some minutes before these people were rescued and represents the refugee crisis on the Mediterranean. Some other situations related to the worldwide social crisis were captured, for instance, the armed conflict in Ukraine, the outbreak of Ebola in Sierra Leone and the cruelty of Boko Haram in Nigeria.
Activities in 2015 World Press Photo
The best shorts are also part of a multimedia contest of the exhibition. This time, Spanish photographer Carlos Spottorno has been awarded the third prize for his project The Gates of Europe. His work is a true reflection of Europe’s migration situation.
At the same time, Photographic Social Vision has also organized different activities to attract people and make them think over the pictures.
On the first day of the exhibition, Thursday, November 12th at 7:30 pm, there will be a debate called ‘Estados fronterizos‘ (borderline states). The conference is free entrance and it will count on the presence of photojournalists.
Some days after, on Tuesday, November 17th, there will be a workshop to complement the guided tour. Its name is ‘Publicar la intimidad‘ (publishing the intimacy) and it will be repeated every Tuesday and Friday from 10 am to 12:30 pm. It requires previous booking.
Considering that the world is constantly changing, photojournalism wants to capture both interior and exterior reality in order to offer a new approach to spectators. As CCCB director Vicenç Villatoro says, “documentary photography is one of the best tools to reach the present”.
Let’s get to know the world in which we live by means of 2015 World Press Photo.
