EU NEIGHBOURS EAST and FOTOFESTIWAL invited professional photographers from Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, the Republic of Moldova and Ukraine to enter an EU-funded photo contest on Family Connections, which ran from November 2022 to January 2023. From a total of more than 400 applications, a team of five top international judges drew up a shortlist of three photographers from each country. Six winners were announced at a Gala in Tbilisi, Georgia, at the end of March. They were each awarded a prize of €1000.
Scroll down to see the shortlisted photographers and winners. You will also find links to the projects they entered. These individual project pages are in English.
ARMENIA
Mane Hovhannisyan
Hrant Khachatryan
Nazik Armenakyan - WINNER
AZERBAIJAN
Aziz Karimov
Orkhan Azimov - WINNER
Ilkin Yagubov
GEORGIA
Natela Grigalashvili - WINNER
Ekaterine Kolesnikova
Why Family Connections?
This contest invited artistic, social and above all personal interpretations of the theme ‘family connections’ in a series of photos.
How does our family connect us to our roots, culture, traditions, attitudes and future? Which connections define a family and make us belong? How do these connections adapt to changing worlds, technology, conflict, love and loss?
Rarely have we experienced the importance and fragility of ‘family connections’ more than in the last three years. Covid-imposed social distancing brought suffering and isolation and transformed many connections, but intensified others. Last year, the whole world saw how war can rip families apart in an instant and how many opened their family homes to refugees.
Jury
Jury
The judges voted on the entries which were submitted via the platform, www.picter.com. The group met online in February to make final decisions.
Lars Boering
Director of the European Journalism Center foundation (EJC) and founder of Triggertale.com, a platform for visual communication and storytelling.
Emma Bowkett
Financial Times Weekend Magazine and a curator focused on lens-based arts and contemporary visual culture.
Arianna Rinaldo
Freelance professional working with photography at a wide range. She is the former artistic director of Cortona On The Move, international photo festival of visual narrative.
Karolina Gembara
Photographer and researcher. Her work revolves around issues like home, belonging, migration, changing lands and identities.
Milica Saracevic
Press and strategic communication officer at the European Commission.
About the Organisers
The contest is organised by the EU NEIGHBOURS EAST programme, in partnership with Fotofestiwal. EU NEIGHBOURS EAST is an EU-funded regional communication programme that raises awareness of the European Union, its policies and support projects in its Eastern Neighbourhood. The programme complements EU Delegations communication in Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Republic of Moldova and Ukraine.
Fotofestiwal was established in 2001 as a collective of professionals working with photography, since then it has grown into one of the most relevant photographic festivals in Europe. Over 20 years, it has developed a wealth of experience in running competitions and showcasing results.