This is a challenging and difficult time for the global community.
The visual journalism community is dealing with a lot of uncertainty: safety concerns, travel bans, budget cuts and cancelled assignments are only a few of the issues visual journalists are facing.
The global situation surrounding the COVID-19 virus has also affected the World Press Photo Foundation. Our annual Awards Show and Festival have been cancelled. The World Press Photo House and PhotoQ Bookshop in Amsterdam have closed their doors temporarily. Some locations of our World Press Photo Exhibition 2020 worldwide tour have been postponed. And our staff are working from home because social distancing is necessary.
We are all in this together. We will continue supporting the conditions that make visual journalism possible and sharing the work of visual journalists to a global audience. The need for visual journalism we can trust has never been greater.
The winners of the 2020 Photo Contest and the 2020 Digital Storytelling Contest - including the winner of the World Press Photo of the Year, World Press Photo Story of the Year, World Press Photo Online Video of the Year, and World Press Photo Interactive of the Year - will be announced on the evening of 16 April 2020 and presented to our global audience through a wide range of online and media channels.
Due to safety concerns, we’re not able to start our exhibition tour on 17 April at De Nieuwe Kerk in Amsterdam. However, we’re looking into new ways of bringing the Exhibition 2020 to our audiences.
We believe in the power of showing and the importance of seeing high-quality visual stories, and we’ll keep on working hard to fulfil our mission: connecting the world to the stories that matter.
Useful resources for visual journalists covering the COVID-19 crisis
Many organizations are putting together resources to ensure the safety of visual journalists covering the COVID-19 crisis, as well as sharing their work and concerns during this difficult time. We’ve gathered here some of the best ones:
- The Everyday Projects COVID-19 Guide for Visual Journalists: tips for visual journalists by Dr. Jenell Stewart to help journalists who are struggling with ethical and safety considerations in the current context.
- Committee to Protect Journalists COVID-19 resource: research on attacks on journalists covering the COVID-19 outbreak, latest safety advice, and Q&As with journalists covering the pandemic in the U.S. and around the world.
- International Women's Media Foundation webinar 'Lessons Learned from Journalists Covering Global Pandemics': journalists from Hong Kong and Italy share their experience covering COVID-19, and journalists who reported on past global outbreaks speak about lessons learned.
- covid19.publicsource.xyz: an ongoing project from Public Source featuring documentary photographers, journalists and writers from across the globe going recording the events related to the COVID-19 virus as they unfold.
- NPPA's COVID-19 resource guide: a comprehensive list of grants, safety guidance, and general advice on how to deal with the current situation.
- COVID-19 freelancer artist resources, including emergency funding.
- ‘Staying Safe, Staying in Business’: Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard’s best practices guide to covering a pandemic.
- How to Disinfect Camera Equipment and Spaces
- UNESCO Resource Center of Responses to COVID-19: wide-ranging efforts of the communication and information communities to tackle the current COVID-19 pandemic.
- Freedom of the Press Foundation: How Journalists Can Work From Home Safely: digital security advice for newsrooms and journalists working from home.
- How Journalists Can Deal With Trauma While Reporting on COVID-19: article written by the Dart Center and published by the Global investigative Journalism Network.
- Reporters Without Borders #Tracker_19: Live updates of COVID-19 impacts of press freedom.
- ICJF Global Health Crisis Reporting Forum
- COVID-19 Dispatches on the Africa is a Country blog.
- Photojournalists Struggle Through the Pandemic, With Masks and Long Lenses: article on The New York Times.
- Intimate Photos Show Families Adapting to a World Changed by Coronavirus: article on National Geographic.
- Safety protocols for covering COVID-19 aim to protect freelancers, by the International Journalists' Network
Articles on ethical considerations
We would like this list to be a collaborative effort. If you have any resources you would like to add to this list so they can be shared, please send your suggestions to: communications@worldpressphoto.org
