The Winner of This Year’s W. Eugene Smith $30,000 Images Grant

The W. Eugene Smith Memorial Fund introduced that photographer Irina Werning from Argentina is this year’s recipient of its $30,000 grant for Humanistic Pictures for her task Las Pelilargas.

Since 1979, the Smith Fund suggests that it has awarded about $1.3 million to photographers for their previous function or proposed initiatives, next in the custom of W. Eugene Smith’s job as a photographic essayist.

“The W. Eugene Smith Grant in Humanistic Photography is presented every year to a photographer whose previous do the job and proposed project, as judged by a panel of authorities, follows the custom of W. Eugene Smith’s dedicated compassion and humanistic tactic to his subjects in the course of his career as a photographic essayist,” the Smith Fund states. “Past recipients have involved Maxim Dondyuk (2022), Nicolò Filippo Rosso (2021), Sabiha Çimen (2020), Mark Peterson (2018), Krisanne Johnson (2011), Stanley Greene (2004), Graciela Iturbide (1987), Donna Ferrato (1985), and Eugene Richards (1981).”

Now in its 44th year, the W. Eugene Smith Fund’s significant $30,000 grant in “humanistic photography” was awarded to Werning who has been seeking and photographing females in Argentina with lengthy hair — a design that is affected by a mix of South American cultures and indigenous traditions — due to the fact 2006.

Ms. Werning’s task was chosen from about 448 entries — the most in the grant’s record — from 68 nations around the world.

The objective of the grant is to support Werning in completing the ultimate chapter of her very long-expression venture and allow for her to return to the towns she frequented early on and doc the impact of globalization on regional traditions when at the similar time celebrating the resilience and attractiveness of their heritage.

“News that I experienced acquired this year’s W. Eugene Smith Grant arrived just when I was about to conclude this own undertaking owing to a absence of funds!” Werning states. “I imagine that images has a duty to doc conflict but also to capture the hope and beauty within just humanity. The grant now provides me the opportunity to go further into the story and handle some of the issues that emerged during this 17-yr journey. I am so grateful for this honor.”

“Irina’s task, I consider, signifies what the W. Eugene Smith legacy and the fund by itself stands for, which is a photographer’s motivation and stubbornness in pursuing the work around the decades and against all odds,” Justyna Mielnikiewicz, one of this year’s Smith Grant judges and recipient of the 2016 Smith Grant, states.

“But it is also the individual attachment and duty a photographer can take for individuals and destinations they document. Irina surely shown that in her challenge.”

Enhanced funding authorized the W. Eugene Smith Fund to give more grants this 12 months: a $10,000 W. Eugene Smith Fellowship, a $5,000 Leonian Finalist Grant, and a $3,000 W. Eugene Smith Scholar Grant gained by Myriam Boulos, Fabian Ritter, and Oyewole Lawal, respectively. On Tuesday, March 26th (from 12:30-1:30 PM ET) the W. Eugene Smith Memorial Fund will host a Zoom convention to honor past grant recipients. The Zoom call will function presentations from Maxim Dondyuk (2022 grant recipient) and Irina Werning (2023 grant recipient), among the other past grant recipients. The virtual awards ceremony can be accessed via the Smith Fund’s internet site.

Graphic credits: Irina Werning, Courtesy of the W. Eugene Smith Memorial Fund