General News, 3rd prize singles, Toshiyuki Tsunenari
Congratulations must go to all the World Press Photo (WPP) winners announced today, but I do have a number of reservations about this year's winners.
I have a routine where, each year, i go to the book store to potentially buy the current World Press Photo year book. I open up the book, carefully look through the photographs and if the photography makes an impact, I'll buy the book. Somehow I don't think that this year's WPP book won't be on my bookshelf.
I've never have been the biggest fan of competitions - probably because i never win anything - but the release of the winning photographs from this year's World Press Photo left me somewhat underwhelmed - I'm especially thinking of this year's World Press Photo of the Year by Samuel Aranda. Photo of the Year? Really??? Does it have that special emotional and visual power? It seems I'm not alone in thinking that it does not.
There are great images among the winners (like the photo above), but for a while now, I've thought that the winning photography has become increasingly formulaic in nature. Even the usually strong sports photography category seems rather dull and lifeless this year. With over 101,000 images submitted to the contest, are the winning entries REALLY the best press photographs from around the world???
Check out the 2012 World Press Photo winners HERE
2 comments:
The biggest problem with judging photography competitions is they are all about opinion - what they like, isn't neccessarily what you like.
There has been quite a lot of criticism about Samuel Aranda's WPP winning image, so i thought i'd add a bit of balance with a link to a post by Tewfic El-Sawy.
http://thetravelphotographer.blogspot.com/2012/02/pov-my-take-on-world-press-photo-of.html
Yet another link to a favourable post defending Samuel Aranda's image from two critics, whose analysis of the image i don't agree with.
After some time I'm starting to warm slightly to the winning image. Some images need a long hard look. Likewise some images have instant appeal only to lose it as time passes. It comes down to personal opinion... it's what fuels and divides photography.
http://www.jeremynicholl.com/blog/2012/02/17/why-the-critics-of-the-world-press-photo-muslim-pieta-are-wrong-by-the-people-who-know-best/
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