It is not the first time, but it has not happened for 30 years. The cover of the 2022 World Press Photo annual book will not include the award-winning photograph of the year.
The award-winning photograph of the year shows the stretcher transfer of Irina Kalinina during the Ukrainian War. The pregnant woman was seriously injured in the Russian bombing of the hospital in Mariupol, in the south of the country. Irina’s baby was stillborn and her 32-year-old mother also died half an hour later.
The photograph is by Ukrainian Evgeniy Maloletka and was taken on March 9, 2022, in the first days of the Russian invasion, and was awarded by World Presso Photo as the best photograph of the year. For this reason, the portrait had to illustrate the cover of the annual book that is now published, but those responsible for the contest that chooses the best works of world photojournalism understood that another photo should be the cover.
The photojournalist was accused by the Russian authorities of altering the image, at a time when they were denying the war crimes committed by Russia in Mariupol. The Russian ambassador to the United Nations and the Russian embassy in London said the image was “fake news.”
The image of Evgeniy Maloletka was replaced by that of the Iranian Ahamad Halabisaz. The Iranian photograph shows a young local woman dressed in Western clothing on a street in Tehran, with others behind her dressed in traditional Iranian clothing. The photograph was taken late last year and received an honorable mention from World Press Photo.
The director of the contest, Joumana El Zein Khoury, explained, in statements to El País, that this work was more suitable to illustrate a book that will be exhibited in souvenir shops and museum bookstores. For the person responsible, the two photographs document the injustice and the risks assumed by the photographers and those photographed. Furthermore, the organization guarantees that it also wants to show respect for the victims.
“I think it is essential that photography be seen by millions of people”
TO TSFPortuguese photojournalist Daniel Rodrigues, who has already won an award in the World Press Photo Dailly Life category, criticizes the decision.
“We are constantly being bombarded with images on social networks and I think it is extremely important to show an image of a photojournalist, the work of a professional who was on the scene, who risked his life to be able to show that image, the truth, the consequences of the attacks that have occurred by the Russians and in a time where there is a lot of talk about artificial intelligence, about fake news, it is very important to show the work of a photojournalist, that is why I think it is very important. “To demonstrate this photo, so that people can see this photo, also to shock, to really alert them to what happened in that case in Mariupol. Therefore, I end up not agreeing with the fact that the photo has not been shown,” says the photojournalist.
Daniel Rodrigues was also in Ukraine at the beginning of the war and reveals that locals asked to have their photographs taken: “We want to show what is happening.” Therefore, although he understands the organization’s justification, Daniel Rodrigues believes that the person photographed would be in favor of publishing the image.
The photographer considers that the Kremlin’s accusations of manipulating the photograph are one more argument in favor of publishing the image: “I think it is essential that the photograph be seen by millions of people to demonstrate that what really happened, that it was not a fake news, it was not staged. It was the pure and harsh reality that happens every day for the last two years in Ukraine.”
It is not the first time, but it has not happened since 1993.
It is not the first time that the winning photograph does not appear on the cover of the book. In 1974, a photo of Salvador Allende leaving the Chilean presidential palace – with a gun and helmet – during the military coup appeared without appearing on the front page.
In 1983 the same thing happened with an image of the massacre of Palestinian refugees during the Lebanon war. Ten years later, in 1993, the photograph of a Somali woman carrying the skeletal corpse for burial in a mass grave also did not appear prominently on the cover.
Source: TSF
