Photographers have until 15 May to submit their work for a chance to win one of this year’s Getty Images Grants.
Established in 2004 by Aidan Sullivan, vice president of photo assignments, the Grants programme has been expanded from documentary photography and photojournalism to include other work, such as portrait photography.
This year, as it celebrates the programme’s 10-year anniversary, Getty Images will be offering six Editorial photography prizes, three Creative Grants for non-profit organisations and photographers, and one Portrait award – totalling $130,000 in cash prizes.
In the Grants for Editorial Photography category, Getty Images will present five $10,000 prizes, which will be awarded to photojournalists pursuing personal projects of journalistic significance. An additional grant, offered in partnership with the Lean In foundation, will be “awarded to a photographer whose project is focused on an important but under-told story about women or girls achieving positive results in their communities or personal lives”.
The winners will be selected by a panel of jurors that include David Furst, the international picture editor at The New York Times; Facebook’s photo community manager Teru Kuwayama; Sarah Leen, director of photography at National Geographic magazine; Amy Yenkin of the Open Society Foundations; and Jean-François Leroy of the Visa pour l’Image festival.
For Sullivan, the grants offer a reprieve for photographers struggling to find backing for their work. “In these difficult financial times, where it has become something of a rarity to obtain funding from traditional sources, this grant offers something of a lifeline.”
In the Creative Grants programme, Getty Images will distribute two $20,000 prizes, which will each be shared between a photographer or filmmaker and an agency partner as “they work together to create compelling new imagery and/or video for the non-profit of their choice.” A third grant will also be awarded to a photographer and agency whose “joint proposal is to develop imagery for a non-profit that focuses on issues related to empowering women, girls, their families and communities.”
Finally, Getty Images is also organising the second edition of its Contour by Getty Images Portrait Prize, offering $10,000 to a photographer with fewer than five years of experience in portraiture work. The jury will include photographer Terry O’Neill, Telegraph Magazine’s director of photography Cheryl Newman, designer Stuart Smith, and Michael Hirschl of the BergHind Joseph Agency.
Visit the Getty Images Grants website to submit your work