Iceland review - 2015, Page 48

46 ICELAND REVIEW
For more than a quarter of a century,
press and magazine photographers in
Iceland have selected their Photo of the
Year. The overall winning picture and win-
ners in the seven categories are sent in by
photographers for judging and annual exhi-
bition. More than 1,000 images were sub-
mitted this time, from 50 photographers.
Just over 100 made it to the exhibition, and
there is only one winner.
This year, the jury, headed by Søren Pagter
from Denmark, head of the esteemed pho-
tojournalism education department at the
Danish School of Media and Journalism,
chose the News Photo of the Year as
the overall Photo of the Year: daily DV
photographer Sigtryggur Ari Jóhannsson’s
portrait of Afghan asylum seeker Ghasem
Mohamadi, who went on hunger strike
for ten days in April 2014 in protest of
his application’s long processing time.
Ghasem, who had been living in Iceland
for two years, had appealed a decision to
deport him to Sweden, believing he would
ultimately be sent back to Afghanistan as
Swedish authorities had also rejected his
application. In October 2014, Ghasem was
granted asylum in Iceland (read more about
asylum seekers on page 52).
In their reasoning for awarding the image
the top prize, the jury stated: “The image
can do nothing else than move the viewer
… It reminds us of the challenges that asy-
lum seekers face in the countries they seek
asylum in and the subject therefore refers
to an international problem.”
Here we present the winning image, the
winning photo essay and our picks of the
rest. *
BY PÁLL STEFÁNSSON.
ONE
PICTURE
OR A
THOUSAND
WORDS