Panel Discussion (Hybrid Event)
Full Exposure: International Women in Photo Awards 2022
Huda Abdulmughni, Finalist, Kuwait, X-ray-No.0-10687
Maryam Firuzi, Laureate, Iran, Scattered Memories of a Distorted Future
Maki Hayashida, KG+ Discovery Award, Japan, Beyond the Mountains
Gala Font De Mora Marti, Prix Cervantes Award, Spain, Weekend
Greta Rico, Solidarity Award, Mexico, Substitute Mother
Ana Elisa Sotelo, Finalist, Peru, Las Truchas (The Trouts)
Irina Werning, Finalist, Argentina, La Promesa (The Promise)
Opening remarks: Suvendrini Kakuchi, FCCJ President
Moderator: Ilgin Yorulmaz, FCCJ 2nd Vice President and Diversity Committee Co-chair
19:00-20:15, Tuesday, April 19, 2022
(The panel and Q & A will be in English.)
The International Women in Photo Association (IWPA) is a French non-profit group that aims to give more visibility to women visual storytellers of all origins and nationalities, while sharing with global audiences diverse stories about the realities of men and women of our planet. Its showcase event is the IWPA Award, a photography competition that is followed by exhibitions of the winning entries in major cities across the world. The winners last year were chosen by an international jury from 750 submissions from a record of 95 countries across all continents.
With a considerable increase of submissions from Asia, Africa and the Middle-East, an international jury of eminent personalities of the world of photography awarded the best female talents of the IWPA Award 2022. The full series of the best photographers, as well as their statements, interviews, and a virtual tour can be seen online at https://iwpa.fr. FCCJ is proud to be one of the host venues to exhibit these distinguished photographers’ work between April 4-May 6.
In a panel discussion to mark the exhibition launch, Diversity Committee has invited the IWPA Award Laureate, and some of the finalists and special award winners to talk about their work and the difficulties they face as women photographers documenting such issues as war, injustice, economic hardship, sexual harassment, oppression, identity, and both natural and man-made crises.
Huda Abdulmughni, a photographer from Kuwait and one of this year’s finalists, is re-framing the material memories of her childhood with CHD - congenital hip dislocation. A work of introspection, X-ray-No.0-10687 explores the story that archival records, x-rays, doctor’s notes, so intimately connected to her, tell through photography.
Maryam Firuzi, the IWPA 2022 Laureate, is an Iranian artist from Tehran working between the media of film and photography. For her winning work, Scattered Memories of a Distorted Future, Firuzi made physical ruins metaphors of pain and loss suffered by Iranians who had to endure political turbulence, drought, the coronavirus and an ever-growing economic crisis. The drawings of the various Iranian female artists on monuments of the past leave many unanswered questions for the future.
Maki Hayashida is a Japanese photographer who won this year’s KG+ Discovery Award with her project Beyond the Mountains, a visual exploration documenting illegal dumping in Japan. Focusing on cases across Japan, the project is a mixture of residents’ archival images and photographs, and materials from public notices by local governments.
Gala Font De Mora Marti, a photographer from Spain was awarded Prix Cervantes with her Weekend project, capturing moments of some of the few drive-in cinemas still in service in Spain. It focuses on the special atmosphere of the microcosm of a drive-in cinema: the intimacy created inside the car, the connection between an individual and the screen, as well as the unique landscape of these places.
Greta Rico is a Mexican documentarian and the winner of this year’s Solidarity Award. Her deeply personal story, Substitute Mother on the universal crisis of feminicide, follows her cousin, a young woman, who becomes the caregiver of her 3-year-old niece Nicole, when her mother is lost as a victim of sexual violence and murder. The series shows how hate crime perpetrated against women does not end with murder, the impact lives with the children, mothers, sisters, grandmothers and aunts.
Ana Elisa Sotelo, a finalist, documented a group of women swimmers that formed during the pandemic in her native Lima, Peru in her series Las Truchas (The Trouts), for which she was awarded IWPA Mention. When citizens 65 and older were banned from public spaces after a strict lockdown, a group of more than 60 women between the ages of 16 and 73 ventured out into Lima’s ocean (and rivers) to practice open water swimming. It’s an ode to these women's collective will to thrive and the connection they formed with each other in times of individuality and reclusiveness.
Irina Werning, an Argentinian photographer and a finalist, met Antonella, 12, while working on her project La Promesa (The Promise), searching and photographing women with unusually long hair mainly in small towns in the mountains of Argentina. As indigenous traditions persist with modern life, many like Antonella abstain from cutting their hair, representing cutting one's thoughts.
*Panelist lineup may change subject to the coronavirus pandemic.
How to attend: This is a hybrid event and will be held both in-person and via Zoom.
In-person: There will be a limited number of seats for in-person attendance with tea/coffee at 550 yen (tax included) per person. Please call the Front Desk 03-3211-3161 or email front@fccj.or.jp
Zoom: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82310217053?pwd=T1dOWjZONjVENVRnODZMZDNRVFFodz09
MeetingID:82310217053
Passcode: 258748
How to ask questions: https://forms.gle/kNpZvQ72H7hWmYsH6
Members watching the event online can submit questions for the speakers in advance using this submission form in English.
Diversity Committee