Since its creation in 1994, the Joop Swart Masterclass has established itself as one of the most prestigious visual journalism education programs. The masterclass encourages new and diverse approaches to documentary, visual journalism, and storytelling through a week-long event in Amsterdam that includes lectures, portfolio reviews, and presentations.
For its 23rd edition, an international group of 12 emerging photographers worked with five experienced visual journalism professionals, who led sessions on the conception, production, and distribution of high-quality visual reports and stories in the contemporary economy of media and photography. Learn more the masterclass.
2016 Participants
Runners-up
The runners-up are automatically nominated in 2017.
- 1st runner up: Karolina Jonderko, Poland*
- 2nd runner up: Clémentine Schneidermann, France
*Hicham Gardaf was unable to join for the week of the masterclass and was replaced by first runner-up Karolina Jonderko.
Theme: 'Consequences'
As part of their preparations for the masterclass, the photographers are required to produce a photo essay on a given theme, this year revolving around ‘Consequences’. Take a look at some of the work produced for the 23rd edition:
Captions: (1) From Notes From The Jungle, © Aapo Huhta. (2) From Disorder, © Abdollah Heidari. (3) © Amanda Mustard, (4) From The Goddess Guide, © Jana Romanova. (5) From Reborn, © Karolina Jonderko. (6) From The Smog Goes East, © Line Ørnes Søndergaard. (7) From Bride’s Veil, © Luisa Dörr. (8) From Distant Thunder, © Mariya Kozhanova. (9) From The Mysterious Case of Pushpa and Others, © Prasiit Sthapit, 2016 Joop Swart Masterclass. (10) From Runaway Lovers, © Samsul Alam Helal. (11) From Réagir, © Sébastien Van Malleghem. (12) From Sea of Trees, © Tomasz Lazar, 2016.
Masters
The masters for the 23rd Joop Swart Masterclass were:
- Laura Boushnak, Palestine, photographer and founding member Rawiya Collective
- Liza Faktor, Russia, visual documentary producer, curator and co-founder of Screen
- Amy Pereira, USA, director of photography at MSNBC
- Jonathan Torgovnik, USA/Israel, photographer
- Donald Weber, Canada, photographer VII Photo Agency
Watch 2016 Joop Swart Masterclass master talks
