The Lucie Foundation is proud to support professional and emerging talent with vision and dynamic ideas that challenge and progress the art form of still photography into work that compels. Our support of photography is broad, from Fine Art to Documentary and Photojournalism, to digital and film-based works. Our concern is to support photographers producing work that is at once gripping, and original.
The Lucie Foundation is proud to offer four cash grants and a variety of prizes to support the work of emerging and established photographers.
Exhibition at Los Angeles Center of Photography
Location: 252 S. Los Angeles St. Los Angeles, CA 90012
Opening Reception: Thursday, November 21st, 6 pm – 8 pm
Exhibition will be on view until December 5th
(LACP will be closed the week of Thanksgiving)
2024 WINNERS
FINE ART - PROFESSIONAL
2024 LUCIE FOUNDATION
$3000 FINE ART SCHOLARSHIP
$3,000 cash prize + Ilford: Portfolio Bag, along with a box of Smooth Pearl 13 x 19” and Smooth Gloss 13 x 19” + PICTO NYC: $500 voucher for services
WINNING RECIPIENT
Marisol Mendez, Padre
PROJECT STATEMENT
‘Padre’ is an interdisciplinary project that interrogates the complex and contradictory ways masculinity is constructed and performed.
The starting point was a bundle of letters my father left me before he passed. In this correspondence, my grandfather addresses his two sons reflecting on his role as an absent parent and relaying advice about how to become a man. The exchanges gave me insight into how different individuals negotiate their relationship with masculinity and navigate its entanglement with violence, power, and patriarchal structures.
Padre scrutinizes the traditional roles imposed on men, drawing on personal history and cultural heritage. It subverts archival family materials to question patriarchal and colonial legacies in pursuit of redefining identities beyond societal confines and emphasizing a collective struggle for authenticity against the backdrop of ingrained biases.
The act of hunting serves as a framework for the project. The archetype of the hunter holds a deep-rooted connection to masculinity and power dynamics. Hunting, whether literal or metaphorical, embodies notions of conquest, control, and the exertion of dominance over one’s surroundings. The juxtaposition of the nurturing and emotional aspects of fatherhood with this primal instinct highlights the hardships men face in reconciling societal expectations of toughness and emotional restraint with their internal struggles and desires for connection and intimacy.
Website: marisol-mendez.com
HONORABLE MENTION
FINALISTS
FINE ART - EMERGING
2024 LUCIE FOUNDATION
$1000 FINE ART SCHOLARSHIP
$1,000 cash prize + Ilford: Portfolio Bag, along with a box of Smooth Pearl 13 x 19” and Smooth Gloss 13 x 19” + PICTO NYC: $500 voucher for services
WINNING RECIPIENT
Olivia de Villaine, Maternal Gaze
PROJECT STATEMENT
The project began in 2021 and is currently ongoing.
My work delves into the intricacies of motherhood, offering a glimpse into the intimate bond between a mother and her child. I seek to capture the raw beauty of this connection while gently suggesting the deep vulnerability at the core of maternity.
Through intentional composition and portrayal, these images strive to celebrate the depth of moments shared between a mother and her child, inspired by my own journey into motherhood. By choosing to obscure the mother’s face, I intend to invite viewers to look beyond individual traits and contemplate the universal essence of maternal love. The models are presented naked to further expose their vulnerabilities, highlighting the delicate, natural skin-to-skin contact between a mother and her child.
By unmasking and transcending the superficial, my aim in this project is to evoke empathy and appreciation for one of the most profound and vulnerable human connections—motherhood. I seek to share with the viewer moments that are normally kept very private and hidden.
Website: oliviadevillaine.com
HONORABLE MENTION
FINALISTS
PHOTOJOURNALISM / DOCUMENTARY - PROFESSIONAL
2024 LUCIE FOUNDATION
$3000 FINE ART SCHOLARSHIP
$3,000 cash prize + Ilford: Portfolio Bag, along with a box of Smooth Pearl 13 x 19” and Smooth Gloss 13 x 19” + PICTO NYC: $500 voucher for services
WINNING RECIPIENT
Rehab Eldalil, From the Ashes, I Rose
PROJECT STATEMENT
From the Ashes, I Rose confronts the harsh realities of human rights violations and the devastating effects of warfare on civilians in the SWANA region, including Palestine, Syria, Iraq, and Yemen. Instead of focusing on the suffering of patients at the Doctors Without Borders hospital in Amman, Jordan, this project reframes their experiences as acts of resilience and resistance.
The project shifts the narrative to celebrate the protagonists’ journeys of rebirth and transformation. Their injuries are depicted as sources of strength and empowerment. Their trauma is metaphorically transformed into superpowers, highlighting their extraordinary resilience.
Combining photography with mixed media created in collaboration with the protagonists, the project features personal visual narratives expressed through drawings and crafts on Polaroid photographs. Craft interventions using diamond painting, a therapeutic method used at the MSF hospital, symbolizing collective recovery and empowerment across diverse cultural backgrounds.
The project aims to challenge prevailing victimhood narratives by emphasizing the agency and creativity of those affected by violence. The award would enable me to expand the project, engage more individuals across the region, and explore various visual storytelling methods. Fostering meaningful dialogue between the Global South and Western communities and encouraging global action against civilian violence.
Website: rehabeldalil.com
HONORABLE MENTION
FINALISTS
PHOTOJOURNALISM / DOCUMENTARY - EMERGING
2024 LUCIE FOUNDATION
$1000 FINE ART SCHOLARSHIP
$1,000 cash prize + Sony: A7M4 camera with a SEL24-70GM2 lens + Ilford: Portfolio Bag, along with a box of Smooth Pearl 13 x 19” and Smooth Gloss 13 x 19” + PICTO NYC: $500 voucher for services
WINNING RECIPIENT
Louis Roth, Fata Morgana
PROJECT STATEMENT
fata morgana explores the ancient tradition of consolidating power through monumental architecture, now reimagined by a modern military dictatorship striving for control.
The New Administrative Capital, a planned city on desert sand, is intended to house 6.5 million people and ease Cairo’s infrastructural burden. Yet, as Egypt’s military leadership relocates its power centers to this remote site, the city remains sparsely populated—a concern for critics of the megaproject.
Despite denied permits and tight press restrictions that led to two nights in a police station, I gained insight into the unnamed capital. Between hopes for jobs and doubts about the project’s purpose, some Egyptians are already navigating the empty cityscape.
Website: louis-roth.de
HONORABLE MENTION
FINALISTS
MEET THE JURY
Lucy Conticello
Director of Photography, M, Le magazine du Monde
Lucy studied archeology and art history at La Sapienza University in Rome.
A chance encounter brought her to work as an assistant photo editor for a newly minted Italian newsweekly called Liberal. After two formative years as junior assistant photo editor under the generous guidance of Manuela Fugenzi, Lucy moved to study photography practice and history at the Maine Photographic workshops in Rockport, Maine. She later went to New York to pursue a career as photo editor, writer and lecturer. She has worked for Business Week, The New York Times, l’Espresso, The New York Times magazine, Courrier International, The International Herald Tribune as well as photography agencies such as Sipa Press, Magnum Photos and –briefly, the AFP.
In 2011 Lucy joined M, the newly redesigned weekend magazine of Le Monde as the Director of Photography coordinating a staff of photo editors in charge of all the editorial assignments (portraits and features) for the magazine. She established the overall photo assigning budget, negotiated contracts as well as usage rights and thanks to her extensive contacts within the photo industry, is in charge of finding the right person for the job and translating the editor’s ideas to the photographers hired. Lucy works closely with the Creative Director, design team and editors to ensure an environment of creative collaboration.
Lucy has been assigning photographers for several years now; what she loves most is the creative process of pairing photographers with stories, researching and brainstorming ideas and seeing how these pictures end up defining the articles.
Photo Credit: Le Monde
Meruro Washida
Director, Towada Art Center
WASHIDA was born in Kyoto in 1973 and currently lives in Towada. He was a curator at the 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art, Kanazawa from 1999 to 2018. He received his master’s degree from the University of Tokyo, where he studied art history. He specializes in contemporary art history and museum studies. He was the curator of the Japan Pavilion at the 57th Venice Biennale held in 2017 and Aichi Triennale 2019.
Photo credit: Kuniya Oyamada
Kristen Gresh
Estrellita and Yousuf Karsh Senior Curator of Photographs at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (MFA)
Kristen Gresh is the Estrellita and Yousuf Karsh Senior Curator of Photographs at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (MFA). At the MFA, her exhibitions have included “Life Magazine and the Power of Photography” (co-organized with Princenton University Art Museum), “Graciela Iturbide’s Mexico” and “She Who Tells a Story: Women Photographers from Iran and the Arab World,” of which she was the author of the exhibitions’ companion publications. Other publications include “Viewpoints: Photographs from the Howard Greenberg Collection” (2019), and contributions to “Ruth Orkin: A Photo Spirit” (2021), “The New Woman Behind the Camera” (2020) and “Une histoire mondiale des femmes photographes” (2020). Previously, Gresh worked as curator and taught history of photography in Cairo and Paris, where she also wrote her PhD dissertation on The Family of Man at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales.
RULES & REQUIREMENTS
WHO CAN APPLY:
The Lucie Scholarships are open to professional and emerging photographers 18 years and older, worldwide. We define “professional” as any photographer who earns the majority of their income from photography. We define “emerging” as any photographer enrolled as a student, in the first five years of their photography career, or does not earn the majority of their income from photography.
WHAT IS REQUIRED TO APPLY:
Please read the following information carefully to make sure your application material is complete.
Incomplete applications will not be considered:
- Project Proposal (1,500 characters max). This proposal should include the following:
- Project Start and End Dates
- Description of your project
- Your Plan for completing the project (i.e. how you intend to approach the project and how you intend to use the scholarship money)
- Five Goals that you plan to accomplish while working on the project (e.g. producing 20 new images, making 5 prints, etc.)
- A one-page biography and/or CV
- Twenty digital images
USE & OWNERSHIP:
The photographer must be the sole author and owner of the copyright of photos entered in to the competition. Copyright and all other rights remain that of the photographer. Any photograph used by Lucie Foundation shall carry the photographer’s credit line.
FAQ
Is there a limit to the number of scholarship applications per artist?
No, you may submit as many applications as you would like.
Can I submit the same project to the two different scholarships?
Yes, you may submit the same project to the two different scholarship categories if you feel the work would lend itself to either category.
Is there a submission fee?
Yes, the submission fee’s are:
• Professional category, $25 /submission
• Emerging category, $15 / submission
What images should I submit?
Please upload 20 digital images from the existing project that you are proposing to continue.
If you have not yet started your proposed project, upload 20 digital images from a previous cohesive project and make a note of this in your proposal.
If you have some finished images but not a full 20, please supplement with images from a previous cohesive project and make a note of this in your proposal.
How should I prepare my files?
Please prepare your files according to the specifications below. JPG only. (NO TIF, GIF, PNG, PDF files will be accepted.)
72 DPI No file should exceed 4mb
Can I send print materials, books or CD’s?
No, Lucie Foundation accepts online submissions only.
When will the shortlist and recipients be announced?
Finalists and Winners will be announced in October / November 2024, exact date TBD.
Can multiple photographers submit a project together?
If you both are actively photographing the project submitted together, yes you can. Prize earnings and prizes will be split between you both. Please put one name in first name section, and one name in last name section when submitting, and make note of it being a multi photographer project in the proposal.
How will I know if I was selected?
If you were selected for the shortlist or as a recipient, you will be contacted directly through the email which you provided in the submission form. The shortlist and recipients will also be announced via the Lucie Foundation newsletter, website, and social media.
Thank you to our Sponsors
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The Los Angeles Center of Photography (LACP) is a crucible that forges creative vision, insight, and experimentation into a vibrant photographic community that expresses the cultural and artistic crosscurrents that are the essence of Los Angeles. LACP is committed to remove any barriers for entry, and it supports, mentors and promotes visual storytellers and their creative journeys, at all stages of life and career.
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In 2015, Picto New York was established as part of its global expansion. Picto New York caters to the requirements of professional photographers and visual artists, ranging from studio services to image retouching, printing, and framing, as well as providing image production, prepress, and traffic services to global luxury brands.
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Experience is paramount and ILFORD has used its knowledge to fine-tune its core competencies to excel in producing innovative products over the years.
As a result, ILFORD is one of the only companies in the world to offer its customers a ‘best in class’ solution for producing outstanding printed images and displays, regardless of their application.
Our team continues to develop technical building blocks to ensure that ILFORD can respond directly to any step change in technology.
The ILFORD name is well established in the history of imaging and today continues to be associated with cutting edge technology thanks to its strong links to the photographic and commercial wide format printing markets, research and development, technical know-how and manufacturing capabilities.
