Media release
World Press Photo 12.11. - 12.12.21
Swiss Press Photo 12.11.2021 - 06.03.2022
The world in 2020: in the grip of COVID
Press photographs are a window on the world today, and a chance to experience it from a different angle and in its multiple facets. This was especially true of 2020, a year dominated by a pandemic that confined many people to their homes. The common thread running through the images in the Swiss Press Photo 21 and World Press Photo 21 exhibitions is, unsurprisingly, COVID, and its impact on populations around the globe. A whole gamut of emotions will therefore be on display at Château de Prangins from 12 November.
The year 2020 etched itself into our memories because of the coronavirus – a subject that no press photographer, regardless of the category in which they work, could ignore. However, the two temporary exhibitions opening at Château de Prangins on 12 November 2021 also present images of other battles around the world, from the struggle against racism and authoritarianism to fighting forest fires or swarms of locusts. For those interested in learning more about the stories behind the contemporary images, the museum will be offering public guided tours every Sunday and a special “Press Photos” day on 30 January 2022 (admission free). Sarah Carp, from the canton of Vaud, was named Swiss Press Photographer of the Year for her series “Parenthèse – Rester à la maison”. Focusing her lens on her daughters aged seven and three during lockdown, she produced a reportage on a new, confined existence in which her children play-act, put on make-up and dress up. The resulting images are touching, poetic and magical. In the World Press Photo competition, Danish photographer Mads Nissen won the jury’s vote with his image “The First Embrace”. Having dealt with the darker side of the COVID crisis, he wanted to capture the empathy and compassion that people show each other every day. He took this shot in a church, without additional light, and without even realising what he was immortalising in his highly symbolic image: the joy of reunion after a long separation, vulnerability, love, but also survival in a pandemic year.
Media material
Swiss Press Photo
World Press Photo