The Helsinki Photo Festival Portfolio Review is an annual international competition to discover, exhibit, and publish new talents in photography.
Closed
since
26 August 2020
8:59 AM

By clicking "Start Submission", you agree to be contacted by the host regarding this opportunity.

About Helsinki Photo Festival

Helsinki Photo Festival, is a cultural non-profit association and a platform that was created to advance and disseminate information about photography.  The association helps artists to affiliate with audiences and experts in the field of photography. It provides artists with an access to an international network and enables them to find new ways to work, get published and exhibit both abroad and in Finland. Annually, Helsinki Photo Festival produces a 12 weeks photography festival during the summer and autumn season. In a matter of just two years, the festival curated over 100 artists, including both emerging and award-winning photographers from over 40 countries, and has attracted a large number of spectators exploring photography in outdoor and indoor exhibitions; from an audience of +40 000 in 2018, the festival expanded into a spectacle of +250 000 people in 2019.

The festival aims to showcase noble and magnificent fine art photography that has not yet been seen in Finland before. The curated exhibitions take place around historic landmarks, warehouses, art centres, galleries, parks and waterfronts located in the metropolitan areas of the city of Helsinki. The program includes curated exhibitions of international and Nordic photography as well as artist talks, workshops, seminars, and portfolio reviews inviting all photo enthusiasts of any age to experience the winning extraordinary images and share their passion for photography.

About Portfolio Reviews 2020

Portfolio reviews are paid reviews sessions with some leading experts in the field of photography including curators, festival directors as well as magazine editors and photobook publishers.

Portfolio Reviews are open to photographers of all levels to showcase their work and to get back professional feedback as well as networking with people who may be able to help you with your career development or lead to exhibitions, publications and much more. Opportunities for critique, guidance, and professional connection are available within a wide range of photographic markets, such as portrait, product, fine art, travel or fashion photography, among many others.

Helsinki Photo Festival Portfolio Reviews as a part of their festival's program from August 28-29, 2020. The event will be held at Ateljee in Kansallismuseo / The National Museum of Finland or digitally, in case COVID-19 travel restrictions will prevent some of the jurors or participants from attending in person.

What Winners Receive

The first prize winner of this year's Portfolio Review will be exhibited solo at Helsinki Photo Festival 2021. The winner and up to three runners up will be also featured in the festival's online gallery on helsinkiphotofestival.com. The winning portfolio and a few selected images of up to three runners up will be promoted on Helsinki Photo Festival's social media channels, Facebook and Instagram, which can reach up to 5000 virtual followers alone. The highest voted portfolios may be also offered the opportunity to participate in the Helsinki Photo Festival limited edition print program in 2021. The winners will be announced online as well as contacted in person via given email by August 29, 2020. 

The Competition Criteria

When examining entries, the jury of reviewers will consider the following criteria:

  • Impact

  • The lighting

  • The story it tells

  • Consistency of the portfolio's theme 

  • Its technical quality

  • Creativity

  • Composition & style

  • Use of colour

  • Presentation

  • Innovative or unique approach to the subject matter

How to enter the contest

  • 1 submitted project equals → one review
  • 2 submitted projects equal → two reviews
  • 3 submitted projects equal → three reviews
  • 4 submitted projects equal → four reviews

If 5 projects are submitted the selected reviewer slots are guaranteed.

The selection process will be organized as follows:

  • Applications through Picter until August 10th, 2020. The total number of submissions is limited to 60, participants are selected on a ‘first applied - first served’ basis. All participants are invited to Helsinki for face-to-face meetings with reviewers. Those who will not be able to travel, will have a chance for a video conference. The criteria for the selection assessment will be originality, coherence and conceptual quality of the projects. The participants can choose the preferred reviewers for their projects, however, the organizers can assign other reviewers for submissions with less than 5 paid reviews. Only the submissions with 5+ paid reviews are guaranteed to get the reviews with selected critics.
  • All participants have to pay 35€ fee for each project, i.e. review when they do the submission of their project. Each project can contain a maximum of 15 pictures. The face-to-face meetings with experts (reviews) will be organized in Helsinki on August 29-30th each review will be 20 minutes. Only the participants finalists who paid for 5+ reviews will get reviews with their selected preferred critics, and for submissions with less than 5 paid reviews the organizers will assign a critic based on availability. 

  • Selection of the Winner: During the portfolio review sessions, each critic will select the best portfolio in his opinion. In a final meeting the critics team will choose the best 5 finalists portfolios, 1 winner and 4 follow up finalists. The winner and finalists will be announced during the weekend, August 29th, 2020.

Timeline

Call for entries open
1 July 2020
Submission deadline
26 August 2020
Winner announcement
29 August 2020
Helsinki Photo Festival: Portfolio Reviews 2020
October 2020

Requirements

Profile

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    Address

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    Biography with up to 1500 characters

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    Nationality

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    Country of residence

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    First name

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    Last name

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    Birthday

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    Gender

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    CV with up to 2000 characters (or PDF file)

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    Phone

Upload

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    1 to 5 projects per submission

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    10 to 15 files per project

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    Allowed file types: JPG

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    At least 1500px on the long edge

Descriptions

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    Project description

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    Project title

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    Project location

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    Project year

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    Image description

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    Image title

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    Image date (year)

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    Select your preferred portfolio reviewer

Jurors

Marianne Ager (DK); Curator of Photography & Film, Brandts Museum of Art and Visual Culture in Odense, Denmark.
Ager (b.1971) holds an MA degree from the University of Southern Denmark. Her particular field of interest is the concept of storytelling in literature, music and art/visual culture. She has worked as culture journalist and wrote reviews of photography books for the Danish Katalog Journal. She was a member of the jury for the Young Nordic Photographer of the Year 2016 award at Fotografiska in Stockholm, Sweden, and served on the jury for Riga Photo Biennial’s 2018 talent award. Ager’s primary interests are fine art photography with a powerful narrative, portraiture with a twist, documentary work and short film projects.

Elina Anttila (FI); Art Historian, Curator, Director of the National Museum of Finland.
Anttila (b. 1963) was educated at the University of Helsinki where she graduated in 1990 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in History and Art History and in 2001 a Ph.D. in Art History. She was a researcher at the unit for collections and research at the Finnish National Museum in 2001–2008 and has since served in various positions. In 2014, she was named Director of the Museum.

Karin Aringer (SE); Head of Contemporary Art & Design Bukowskis Sweden.
Aringer’s speciality is photographs and contemporary art and she is in charge of the Contemporary Art & Design fine art auction at Bukowskis Sweden.

Alexa Becker (DE); Acquisitions Editor for photography and art books for Kehrer Verlag.
Becker obtained her Master's in Art History from the University of Heidelberg. She started her career at Kehrer in 2003, where she is responsible for selecting and acquiring new photography-related projects. Mrs. Becker provides artistic and marketing advice for photographers concerning the content and style of their work at several international portfolio reviews. She enjoys helping photographers and others appreciate the special qualities present in their work - in particular discovering novel, genuine visions of the world. Mrs. Becker serves at several international portfolio reviews as a reviewer and sits on a number of online juries.

Nela Eggenberger (AT); Chief Editor at EIKON – International Magazine for Photography & Media Art.
Eggenberger studied Art History in Vienna. Since 2013, she has been the Chief Editor of EIKON – International Magazine for Photography and Media Art. Previously, she was involved in various editorial activities, e.g. for Frame. The State of the Art, MUMOK, WestLicht (all based in Vienna). She was a publisher of 5×5. Photo Tracks (2016) and worked on exhibitions in cooperation with KUNST HAUS WIEN (Pas de Deux, 2015), BAWAG P.S.K. Contemporary (Fragile, 2013, with Gregor Ecker), among others.

Maria Faarinen (FI); Chief Curator at The Finnish Museum of Photography.
Faarinen (b. 1981) has been working in the museum since 2007. In addition to expertise in contemporary art and exhibition producing, she has an extensive knowledge of photo archives and different genres of photography.

Emanuela Mirabelli (IT); Photo Editor, Marie Claire Italy.
Mirabelli (born in Milan) has always been intrigued by all that is expressed through the images. After high school she started to write movie reviews for magazines, while studying Art History at the University. In parallel she developed a deep interest in photography which has translated soon into a profession. She worked for Photo magazine and then became the Executive Director of Carla Sozzani Gallery, the leading photography gallery in Milan. Since 2003, she has been working as Photo Editor of Marie Claire Italy magazine, where she publishes a huge variety of works, from classic reportages to new languages in contemporary photography, as well fine art portfolios and a huge variety of authors, from new talents to worldwide well known photographers. Also, she writes texts and holds various lectures about photography and courses about photo editing. She does portfolio reviews in many festivals and she is a jury member of international photo awards.

Moritz Neumüller (AT); Barcelona based Curator, Educator and Writer in the field of Photography and New Media.
Neumüller has worked for institutions such as MoMA New York, La Fábrica Madrid and PhotoIreland Festival. He is the Academic Director of the Photo Department of IED Madrid, and a regular contributor to magazines such as European Photography, foam and Photoresearcher. Since 2010, he has been running The Curator Ship, an online resource for visual artists. Recent curatorial projects for Daegu Biennial (Korea), Photobook Week Aarhus (DK), and The Birmingham Library (UK).

Rafael Rybczynski (DK); Curator and the Artistic Director of Helsinki Photo Festival.
Rybczynski has been building his professional career in the cultural and creative industries for over 20 years. He is known for fostering emerging and established talents. He has worked for artists, brands and startups with new products and services, creativity and innovation, events, sourcing and publishing digital and visual content. In 2017, he founded Helsinki Photo Festival and since then has been at the helm of this project. Rafael has an MA degree in Interaction Design from Malmö University in Sweden, and a BA from the Copenhagen School of Design and Technology in Denmark.

Nina Refsnes (NO), Senior Advisor and Grant specialist, Nordic Culture Point
Nina Refsnes is a Senior Advisor at Nordic Culture Point in Helsinki, working mainly with the grant programmes. Before moving to Finland, she worked for many years at Arts Council Norway, both in the Visual Arts Department and with the artist grants. Refsnes is educated from the Academy of Fine Arts, KHiO in Oslo, Norway and the Academy of Fine Arts at NTNU, Norwegian University of Science and Technology in Trondheim, Norway. Refsnes has also studied cultural studies at the University of Southeast Norway and has previously worked as an artist, curator and project manager within the cultural sector in Norway.

Nita Vera (FI); Photography & PhD student of Photography at Aalto University.
Vera (b. 1986) is a visual artist working with photography, text, cinematography, performance and installation in her artistic practice. Currently she is working on her PhD studies at the Aalto University of Art, Design and Architecture.

Marigold Warner (UK); Associate Online Editor of the British Journal of Photography.
Warner has been managing editorial content for BJP-online.com, where she has been part of the team since April 2018. This was preceded by a degree in English Literature and History of Art at the University of Leeds, followed by an MA in Magazine Journalism from City, University of London. Her words have also been published in the Telegraph Magazine, Disegno, and the Architects Journal.

Stig Marlon Weston (NO); Photographer, Curator and Director of the CYAN studio collective.
Weston (b. 1974) is based in Oslo, Norway. He shares his time between his own practice as a photo artist, running the studio collective CYAN studio and working as a commercial photographer. Focusing on process based and philosophical photography Stig uses cameraless techniques and analog processes to make his pictures become unique proofs of a truth unseen by human eyes. He wants to connect the subject closer to image and aims to encourage the viewer to reflect on what they expect to see and understand in a photograph. His work has been exhibited in many countries. Also, Stig curates and organizes exhibitions and photography events with other photographers´ works.

Naoya Yoshikawa (JP); Artists of Photography, Director of Daegu Photo Biennale 2016, Korea, Professor at Osaka University of Arts. Photography, B.F.A., Arts and Culture, M.A. 2000-2001, Osaka University of Arts. Guest Scholar of Long Island University, New York / Overseas Study Program for Artists of the Agency for Cultural Affairs of Japan. Director of Daegu Photo Biennale 2016, Korea. 350 and more numerous exhibitions, festivals, workshops in many countries.

FAQ

What is the entry fee to submit to the Helsinki Photo Festival?
Pack of 5 reviews €240. Student pricing per pack of 5 reviews €175.

When does the call close and open?
The call opens Tuesday, June 30, 2020 at 11:59 AM Eastern Standard Time. The call closes Monday, August 10, 2020 at 17:59 PM Eastern European Time.

Where can I sign up for a Picter account?
Visit picter.com to sign up for a free account.

I would like to submit more than one project is it possible?
The open call allows submission of one (1) project only. In a project you can submit 10-15 images, either as 10 works or 10-15 works in a series.

Can I edit my portfolio once it has already been submitted? No, all submissions are final. in the event of uncertainties, please contact support@picter.com.

What happens to work that is selected? Each photographer will have five appointments, each with a duration of twenty minutes. The appointments will be held over two days and are celebrated with strict punctuality. The reviews will be given in English. The organization will do its best to arrange appointments with the reviewers preferred by each of the photographers. The organization will send each participant a personal schedule close to the dates, once we near the dates of the event.

If I am not selected, will I receive feedback and suggestions for my work? Due to the large number of entries, it is not possible to provide personalized feedback for artists.

Where can I get involved in discussions about the Helsinki Photo Festival? To connect with us and ask questions regarding the Portfolio reviews 2020 by the Helsinki Photo Festival, follow Helsinki Photo Festival on Facebook, @HkiFotoFestival on Twitter, and @helsinkiphotofestival on Instagram. Stay tuned for updates and answers to your questions.

Closed
since
26 August 2020
8:59 AM

By clicking "Start Submission", you agree to be contacted by the host regarding this opportunity.