Call for aspiring photojournalists to submit work

ASPIRING photojournalists are being invited to showcase their work at the Andrei Stenin International Press Photo contest, which Independent Media has partnered with.

Independent Media announced it would be the South African media partner of the Andrei Stenin International Press Photo contest, one of the world’s premier photo competitions that aims to promote young photographers and attract public attention to photojournalism.

The competition is named after Andrei Stenin, a photo correspondent who died while on assignment in the Ukraine in 2014. It aims to develop high standards for documentary photography in Russia and around the world.

Dr Iqbal Survé, the executive chairman of Independent Media, said: “It is a huge honour for us to be associated with this prestigious contest which underscores our company’s human capital objective to encourage and promote young talent.

“It also contributes to facilitating the relationship between media companies based in Brics member countries.”

This year’s competition theme is “visualising a path to global understanding” and is in line with the International Year of Global Understanding proclaimed by Unesco.

The contest will showcase five categories under which contestants can compete in. The categories include “My Country”, “World Colours”, “Harmony of Life”, “Portraits: A Hero of our Time”, “Top News” and “Sport”.

Alexander Shtol, the director of photography at Russian news agency Rossiya Segodnya, said: “This year’s jury will be represented by many schools of photography in order to evaluate the young contestants in all their diversity. The newly created photo categories will allow participating photojournalists to illustrate different aspects of life in greater profundity than ever before.”

Three winners will be announced in each category. The 1st, 2nd and 3rd prizes amount to 50 000, 35 000 and 25 000 roubles respectively (approximately R124 000, R174 000 and R249 000) with the Grand Prize set at 500 000 roubles (approximately R2 million to R4m).

Last year’s competition gathered more than 5 000 works from 54 countries around the world, as well as from every corner of Russia, stretching from Moscow and St Petersburg to Vladivostok and Nakhodka.

For this year, applications can be submitted by photographers aged 18 to 33 to the stenincontest.com website until March 22.