The World Photography Organisation is delighted to announce Independent Curator and Photography Consultant Monica Allende as the new Chair of the Professional Competition jury. Also announced is the judging panel for the Sony World Photography Awards 2024, and forthcoming dates for the exhibition which returns to Somerset House, London from 19 April – 6 May 2024.

Now in its 17th year, the Sony World Photography Awards are one of the world’s largest and most prestigious photography competitions, championing the best contemporary photography from across the world and providing participating photographers with important international exposure and career-building opportunities.

Sony supports the Awards to help with the continued development of photographic culture by offering a global platform to the talent of today. Entry to the Awards is completely free and photographers are judged anonymously by a panel of industry-leading judges.

This year, esteemed Independent Curator and Photography Consultant Monica Allende is appointed as the new Chair of the Jury for the Professional Competition and curator of the Sony World Photography Awards 2024 exhibition at Somerset House, London. Bringing her wealth of experience in the photography world, Allende has previously held numerous high-profile positions across the industry including as Artistic Director of both the Landskrona Foto Festival and the GetxoPhoto International Image Festival, and as former Photo Editor at the Sunday Times Magazine, where she launched the award-winning photography section Spectrum. Allende is curator of the Blues Skies Project, which was shortlisted for the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize 2019 and lectures at the London College of Communication and EFTI (Centro Internacional de Fotografía y Cine) in Madrid.

This year’s judges bring a breadth of knowledge and expertise from varied photographic backgrounds:

Professional Competition

• Elena Navarro, Photo Curator, Producer, and Consultant, Mexico
• Mutsuko Ota, Editorial Director, IMA Magazine, Japan
• Elisabeth Sherman, Senior Curator, Direction of Exhibitions and Collections, International Center of Photography (ICP), United States
• Tanzim Wahab, Curator, Spore Initiative, Germany and Festival Director, Chobi Mela, Bangladesh
• Monica Allende, Independent Curator, Photography Consultant and Chair of the Jury

Open and Youth Competitions

• Daniel Blochwitz, Curator, Foto Festival Lenzburg, Switzerland

Student Competition

• Ravi Ghosh, Deputy Editor, British Journal of Photography, UK

In 2024, the Sony World Photography Awards exhibition opens at Somerset House, London from 19 April – 6 May.

Following the London exhibition and subsequent presentations in Tokyo, Ho Chi Minh City and Milan, the Sony World Photography Awards 2023 exhibition travels next to Berlin where it will be on view at the Willy-Brandt-Haus, 17 November 2023 – 28 January 2024.

For more details, please visit worldphoto.org.

The Sony World Photography Awards opened on 1 June 2023. Full competition and categories descriptions can be found at www.worldphoto.org/sony-world-photography-awards.

Deadlines for submission across the Awards’ four competitions are:

• Professional - 12 January 2024, 13:00 GMT
• Open - 5 January 2024, 13:00 GMT
• Student - 30 November 2023, 13:00 GMT
• Youth - 5 January 2024, 13:00 GMT

All category winners of the Professional, Open, Youth and Student competitions will receive digital imaging equipment from Sony. In addition, cash prizes of $25,000 (USD) will be presented to the Photographer of the Year, $5,000 (USD) to the Open Photographer of the Year and $5,000 (USD) to the winner of the Sustainability Prize. The winner of the Photographer of the Year title will also be rewarded with a solo presentation of their work as part of the Sony World Photography London exhibition the following year. All winning and shortlisted photographers’ works will be exhibited at the annual Sony World Photography Awards exhibition in London and will then be toured internationally. The winning images will also be published in the annual Awards’ book.

For more information, please contact Polly Brock / Vanda Ivančić at media@creoarts.com.

About Sony World Photography Awards

Produced by the World Photography Organisation, the internationally acclaimed Sony World Photography Awards is one of the most important fixtures in the global photographic calendar. Now in its 17th year, the free-to-enter Awards are a global voice for photography and provide a vital insight into contemporary photography today. For both established and emerging artists, the Awards offer world-class opportunities for exposure of their work. The Awards additionally recognise the world’s most influential artists working in the medium through the Outstanding Contribution to Photography award; previous recipients include William Eggleston (2013), Mary Ellen Mark (2014), Martin Parr (2017), Candida Höfer (2018), Nadav Kander (2019), Gerhard Steidl (2020), Graciela Iturbide (2021), Edward Burtynsky (2022) and Rinko Kawauchi (2023). The Awards showcase the works of winning and shortlisted photographers at a prestigious annual exhibition at Somerset House, London. Our hashtags to follow are #SonyWorldPhotographyAwards and #SWPA2024.

About World Photography Organisation

World Photography Organisation is a leading global platform dedicated to the development and advancement of photographic culture. Its programming and competition initiatives provide valuable opportunities for artists working in photography and help broaden the conversation around their work. The Sony World Photography Awards is World Photography Organisation’s principal programme. Established in 2007, it is one of the world’s biggest and most prestigious photography competitions; celebrating the work of leading and emerging practitioners and attracting tens of thousands of visitors annually to its exhibitions worldwide. World Photography Organisation is the photography strand of Creo, responsible for delivering initiatives and programming across three sectors: photography, film and contemporary art. Follow the World Photography Organisation on Instagram (@worldphotoorg), Twitter (@WorldPhotoOrg) and LinkedIn/Facebook (World Photography Organisation).

Creo

Creo initiates and organises events and programming across three key strands: photography, film and contemporary art. Established in 2007 as World Photography Organisation, Creo has since grown in scope, furthering its mission of developing meaningful opportunities for creatives and expanding the reach of its cultural activities. Today, its flagship projects include the Sony World Photography Awards, Sony Future Filmmaker Awards, PHOTOFAIRS Shanghai, Photo London and PHOTOFAIRS New York. Working in partnership with Angus Montgomery Arts, Creo helps deliver the group’s ventures, comprising some of the world’s leading art fairs. Taking its name from the Latin for ‘I create’, it is in this spirit that Creo sets out to empower and give agency to creative voices. 

About Sony Electronics Asia Pacific Pte. Ltd.

Based in Singapore, Sony Electronics Asia Pacific Pte. Ltd. is a subsidiary of Sony Corporation. It serves as the regional headquarters for Sony’s electronics business, overseeing Asia, Middle East and Africa regions. For more information on Sony’s products and services, please visit www.sony-asia.com.

About Sony Group Corporation

Sony Group Corporation is a creative entertainment company with a solid foundation of technology. From Game & Network Services to Music, Pictures, Electronics Products & Solutions, Imaging & Sensing Solutions and Financial Services – Sony’s purpose is to fill the world with emotion through the power of creativity and technology. For more information, visit: sony.com/en.

About Sony Corporation

Sony Corporation is responsible for the Entertainment, Technology & Services (ET&S) business in the Sony Group. With the vision of “continuing to deliver Kando and Anshin* to people and society across the world through the pursuit of technology and new challenges,” Sony will create products and services in areas such as home entertainment & sound, imaging, and mobile communications. For more information, visit: www.sony.net.

*Both Japanese words, Kando means emotion and Anshin has various meanings such as peace of mind, reassurance, reliability and trust.

Monica Allende is an independent curator, artistic director, consultant and educator. She was Artistic Director of the Landskrona Foto Festival from 2019 to 2022 and was GetxoPhoto International Image Festival Artistic Director from 2017 to 2019. She curated the exhibition ‘Light’ at Peckham24 during Photo London 2021, and was the FORMAT17 International Photography Festival director, and has collaborated with WeTransfer as a Consultant and Creative Producer. She is curating the Blues Skies Project, a multidisciplinary project with artist Anton Kusters, as part of the V&A permanent collection, due to be exhibited in 2024. The project was shortlisted for the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize 2019 and exhibited at Les Rencontres d’Arles in 2021. She advises CAMPO.lat, a grassroots digital platform in Latin America, on strategy and programming and also collaborates with VII Foundation on their educational and mentorship programmes. Allende was the Photo Editor at the Sunday Times Magazine, where she launched Spectrum, the award-winning photography section. She is a visiting lecturer at the London College of Communication, London & EFTI in Madrid. Dedicated to nurturing new and established talent, Allende nominates, and judges numerous photography awards and artists’ residencies, and is on the Board of Trustees and advisory boards of Photoworks and the Deutsche Börse Foundation advising on curatorial practices.

Elena Navarro is the founder and artistic director of the International Photography Festival FOTOMÉXICO, a platform for reflection, dissemination, and photographic production. She previously directed the Centro de la Imagen de la Ciudad de México before founding Espacio V, a non-profit foundation aiming to increase the presence of contemporary photography in the daily lives of people in Latin America, in 2020. Throughout her career, Elena Navarro has established and strengthened bridges of collaboration in the cultural ecosystem of photography and image-making through projects between institutions, museums, public and private collections, artists, and creators. In the last decade, she has focused on making the work of women artists and creators from Mexico and Latin America visible in dialogue with Europe, the United States, and the rest of the world. Elena has also served as part of the jury, as a nominator, and portfolio reviewer for several awards, including the Prix Pictet and the ICP Infinity Award, and was the Cultural Director of the Magnum Photos 75th Anniversary Project in New York in 2022. She is currently an ambassador for Paris Photo in Mexico and Latin America.

Mutsuko Ota is Editorial Director of IMA Magazine. She previously worked as an editor at Marie Claire, and at several major men’s magazines, including Esquire and GQ, as a features editor. Besides collaborating with numerous publications as a freelance editor, she became involved in a variety of projects including book and museum catalogue editing, artists’ projects and film promotion. Mutsuko is currently the editorial director of IMA Magazine, where she launched their website imaonline.com in 2012, and began to publish photo books via IMA Photobooks. Mutsuko is additionally the exhibition director of Asama International Photo Festival in 2018.

Elisabeth Sherman is Senior Curator, Director of Exhibitions and Collections at the International Center of Photography (ICP) in New York. Her first exhibition at ICP, Muriel Hasbun: Tracing Terruño, is on view from September 2023 – January 2024. Previously, as an Assistant Curator at the Whitney Museum of American Art, she curated and co-curated numerous exhibitions at the museum, including Time Management Techniques (2022), Dawoud Bey: An American Project (2019-2022) which had a four venue tour and won the Lucie Award for Photo Museum Exhibition of the Year in 2021, Making Knowing: Craft as Art, 1950-2019 (2019-2022) and the Whitney’s presentation of Zoe Leonard: Survey among numerous others. She has written for exhibition catalogues and artist’s monographs as well as contributed to Artforum and Art in America. She is a board member of Burnaway in Atlanta.

Tanzim Wahab is a curator, researcher and lecturer. He lives in Berlin and Dhaka. His curatorial interests revolve around the sensory and community entanglement of cultural spaces, locational practice(s) and alternative art education. He is the festival director of Chobi Mela International Festival of Photography, Dhaka, and curator, community facilitator of Spore Initiative, Berlin. Between 2016 to 2021, he served as the chief curator of Bengal Foundation, heading several curatorial research projects and exhibitions across South Asia. Wahab, alongside Munem Wasif, has published two editions of Kamra – a comprehensive publication in Bengali, setting ideas and debates of photographic history and theories. He is currently co-editing ‘Primary Documents’ South Asia- A MoMA publication on cross-regional art history. Wahab was the Vice Principal of Pathshala South Asian Media Institute from 2013 – 2015, and is currently a trustee and lecturer at the institute. He has been recently appointed as a co-curator of the Biennale für aktuelle Fotografie 2024, Germany.

Daniel Blochwitz is a photography specialist, working as curator, author, lecturer and advisor. He received a Master’s degree in Photography from the University of Florida in 2003. Afterwards, he attended the postgraduate Independent Study Program at the Whitney Museum in New York. For more than a decade he worked for galleries in New York and Zürich before turning to curating. He has implemented a number of well-received solo and group exhibitions at museums, galleries, festivals and off-spaces, was appointed artistic director at photo basel (2018-2019) and currently serves as curator at Fotofestival Lenzburg. He has taught and written about photography and visual literacy extensively. He lives and works in Zurich, Switzerland.

Ravi Ghosh is deputy editor at British Journal of Photography. Previously, he was an editor at Elephant magazine and worked on the Life & Arts supplement at the Financial Times. He writes on arts and culture for The Guardian, Prospect, Tribune, i-D, Bandcamp, Royal Academy Magazine and more. He has also written photobook introductions for Tony Mak and Portrait of Humanity, and has lectured and reviewed portfolios at LCC, Fotografia Europea and PhotoIreland.

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Cheryl Yeo
BlueCurrent for Sony Electronics
Asia Pacific and Singapore
Email: SNG.Sony@bluecurrentgroup.com

Melanie Shum
Sony Electronics Asia Pacific
Email: Melanie.Shum@ap.sony.com