Emeric Lhuisset

Theatre of War and L’Autre Rive

28 April - 22 May 2021

The fifteenth recipient of the award has been named as Parisian-born artist Emeric Lhuisset with his combined series Theater of War and L’Autre Rive. Theatre of War examines the theatrical image of conflict, staging real Kurdish guerilla fighters in war settings to blur the boundaries between art and journalism. L’Autre Rive depicts the same subjects eight years later, after they had become refugees in Europe. “I want to deconstruct the viewer's gaze on refugees,” says Lhuisset. “I am confronting them with the paradox that Kurdish fighters — who were heroised by most Westerners for their fierce fight against ISIS — are considered outcasts and parasites by many of these same people once they have crossed the sea.”

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This year's jury were:

Yumi Goto - Curator, Editor, Researcher

Itō Takahiro - Photographic Art Museum Curator

Azu Nwagbogu - Founder and Director of African Artists’ Foundation

Simon Bainbridge - Former Editorial Director, British Journal of Photography)

Hannah Watson - Director, TJ Boulting