Winner of 5th Carmignac Gestion Photojournalism Award on Iran: Newsha Tavakolian

The theme of this fifth edition is Iran, power at the center of international geostrategic issues. Its geographical position, its economic situation, its nuclear potential demonstrate that Iran is at a defining moment in its history.

The jury, chaired by Anahita Ghabaian, director of the Silk Road Gallery in Tehran, selected Newsha Tavakolian as the fifth laureate of the Carmignac Gestion Photojournalism Award on 30 October 2013. She completed her report between December 2013 and April 2014 in Iran. Her identity has been kept secret until now for security reasons.

Her in-depth report focuses on the sense of claustrophobia besetting the country’s Burnt Generation. Her photographs portray young people grappling with the contradictions between an increasingly modern society, inflexible religious rules and nostalgia for the Persian empire.

Newsha Tavakolian’s remarkable pictures will be exhibited at the Chapelle des Beaux-Arts in Paris from 7 November to 7 December 2014. The exhibition will also tour to London, Frankfurt and Milan. A book will be published to coincide with the exhibition.

A self-taught photographer, Newsha Tavakolian (born 1981 in Tehran, Iran) began working professionally in the Iranian press at the age of 16 at a women’s daily newspaper called Zan. At the age of 18, she was the youngest photographer to cover the 1999 student uprising, which was a turning point for the country’s blossoming reformist movement and for Newsha personally as a photojournalist; a year later she joined the New York based agency Polaris Images. In 2002 she started working internationally, covering the war in Iraq for several months. She has since covered regional conflicts and natural disasters and has made social documentaries in Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Yemen. Her work is published in international magazines and newspapers such as Time Magazine, Newsweek, Stern, Le Figaro, Colors, The New York Times, Der Spiegel, Le Monde, NRC Handelsblad and The New York Times Magazine.

More pictures from Newsha Tavakolian’s project:

The Carmignac Foundation launched the Carmignac Gestion Photojournalism Award in 2009 with the aim of supporting and promoting investigative photojournalism in areas not in the spotlight yet at the heart of complex geostrategic issues with global repercussions and where human rights and freedom of speech are often violated. Gaza, Pashtunistan, Zimbabwe, Chechnya and Iran were the locations selected for the first awards. The chosen theme for the sixth award is lawless areas in France.

With a prize set at 50,000 euro, this award aims to fund in-depth photographic reports that reflect the complexity of the current situation. The Carmignac Foundation undertakes to support the winner throughout the project by monitoring his/her progress in the field as well as promoting and running a touring exhibition in France, Italy, Germany and the UK and financing a monograph. The Carmignac Foundation also commits to buying four photographs resulting from the winner’s endeavours.

In keeping with the values of courage, independence, transparency and sharing held dear by staff at Carmignac Gestion, the Carmignac Foundation is committed to championing the views of involved individuals that are far from the standard blueprint.

Created in 2000, the Carmignac Foundation has its roots in Carmignac Gestion’s corporate collection, which has been on display in the management company’s premises from the start. Built up over the past twenty-five years with an open mind and no restrictions, this unique compendium of contemporary art reflects the personal favourites of Carmignac Gestion’s founder, Edouard Carmignac, a seasoned fund manager and stockbroker. The Carmignac collection currently boasts more than 200 works of art from the 20th and 21st centuries, including major ones by Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, Keith Haring, Jean-Michel Basquiat and Gerhard Richter. Selected on the basis of how evocative they are, the quality of their composition and how powerful a message they convey, the most recent additions to the collection show a strong emphasis on emerging market countries.

The Carmignac Foundation has always been committed to sharing and open to dialogue with the widest possible audience. In keeping with that commitment, the Foundation, headed by Gaïa Donzet, plans to open new premises in 2016 on the protected island of Porquerolles. Architect Marc Barani and landscape architect Louis Benech will be designing the site in a way that fully respects this stunning natural environment and meets the rigorous building permit requirements. A programme of on-site sculpture commissions by young international artists has been launched in order to integrate contemporary art into an extraordinary setting that can both enhance the viewing experience and help make a new generation of artists better known.