Press release October 2011

The European Photo Exhibition Award – epea for short – aims to create a free space where socially relevant topics concerning Europe are developed and discussed by talented photographers who live and work in Europe and who still are at an early stage of establishing themselves as professional photographers. The twelve appointed photographers will translate their observations, analyses and statements on a set and socially relevant subject into a photo essay. The results will be presented in a joint touring exhibition within Europe.

This initiative by the Fondazione Banca del Monte di Lucca (Italy), the Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian (Portugal), the Fritt Ord Foundation (Norway) and the Körber-Stiftung (Germany) aims to contribute to and to intensify dialogue within Europe. It also wants to support young European photographers at the beginning of their careers by providing international facilities. Each foundation selects one curator – a specialist in photography – who is in charge of nominating three talented photographers, of taking on the role of mentoring and of curating the exhibitions. The twelve photographers are given a period of six months to produce their body of work on the given subject in form of a photo essay. In addition, the twelve winning photographers receive a grant and participate in two workshops. These offer them the opportunity to work together with experts on the chosen topic and to exchange views and share working methods with the other European photographers and the four curators. Finally, the touring exhibition throughout top exhibition venues and festivals such as Paris Photo gives the upcoming photographers the chance to present themselves at prestigious locations. All four partner foundations commit themselves to this philosophy and welcome foundations from other European countries to join this project as the European space should be represented by as many countries and views as possible.

The European Photo Exhibition Award 01 – Topic 01: European Identities

The European Photo Exhibition Award 01 focuses on the question of “European Identities”. An issue that refers politically to the question of social cohesion. What resources do we require to develop European identities? And how can being a citizen change from the membership of an abstract category to becoming an important aspect of one’s own identity? Every question of what unifies us in our diversity and how we deal with the diversity within a European entity combines, from a sociological view, diversity and fluidity with sameness and continuity. Against this background, the twelve appointed European photographers will explore their own views on European identities.

The first exhibition opening will be held in May 2012 at the House of Photography at Deichtorhallen Hamburg, followed by Paris during Paris Photo 2012, by Lucca during Lucca Photo Fest 2012 and Oslo in 2013. The curators Rune Eraker (freelance photographer, Oslo), Sérgio Mah (curator and sociologist, Lisbon), Enrico Stefanelli (artistic director Lucca Photo Fest, Lucca) and Ingo Taubhorn (curator at the House of Photography, Hamburg) chose twelve photographers who are in the middle of their working process.

The twelve appointed photographers are Catarina Botelho (Lisbon, Portugal), José Pedro Cortes (Lisbon, Portugal), Gabriele Croppi (Milan, Italy), João Grama (Lisbon, Protugal), Monica Larsen (Oslo, Norway), Frederic Lezmi (Cologne, Germany), Pietro Masturzo (Naples, Italy), Hannah Modigh (Stockholm, Sweden), Davide Monteleone (Rome, Italy), Linn Schröder (Hamburg, Germany), Marie Sjøvold (Oslo, Norway), Isabelle Wenzel (Amsterdam, The Netherlands).